The New York Detective that Complicated my Life
by CSIFanRider
Summary: Annabel Stevens just wants to make it as a big city photographer in New York. When she get's grabbed at knifepoint on the streets and Detective Don Flack comes to the rescue, things just get complicated from there on out.
1. Chapter 1

**Bright Lights Big City**

No matter what people with statistics say for that matter, I Love New York. Sure people get mugged everyday and traffic during rush hour is a pain in the ass but despite all this it's still a beautiful city. Granite I've only been in the city for a few months now but it's finally warming up to me. Every down side has its place, at least I hope it does. The past 4 months no I'm not going to lie I have been a piece of work. Moving from Tulsa Oklahoma to live out my dream of becoming a big city photographer was tougher than I thought it would be. I still have the dream though of people looking up at billboards, seeing pictures and recognizing them as my, Annabel Stevens, work. The only break I've had so far though is a crazy cat lady Who asked me to take a picture of every single one of her 12 cats. Pay was good so guess I can't complain. Right now though I'm starting to think my cousin tony was right, that I'm just not cut out for the big city. Then again Cousin Tony is about as smart as a butter knife. Well, I'll just have to take it step by step then.

I'm sitting at my computer, refreshing my email for what seems like the billionth time, see if I have any new shoots. So far nothing. shaking my head, I stand up from my computer chair, and walk to my barely finished living room and plop down on my beating down couch. " I've really gotta get a life and I'm talking to myself, that's just wonderful." I mutter to myself as I run my hand through my blonde hair. Shaking my head once again, I get up off the couch and head towards the freezer in my kitchen, hoping to have some vanilla ice cream left. Sadly though, I don't. Well, guess I can go get some then. Grabbing my coat and my keys, I quickly lock up my place then head out. When I get to the street, I start walking to the convenience store down the street. I'm walking down the street with my hands in my pockets and my head down when I start to get the feeling someone's watching me. Ignoring the feeling, I continued walking down the street. I can't ignore the feeling anymore when I feel someone stick something sharp pain in my lower back, which is probably a knife.

"Hey Pretty lady. Give me your money and your pretty face won't get hurt." Ohhh shit, this isn't good.

"I don't have any money on me." I lied, which probably wasn't a smart thing to do to the person that had a knife in my back.

"I think you're lying to me." The man snarled in my ear. As I breathed through my nose, I smelled the distinct smell pf cigarettes and alcohol, great combination.

"Why would I lie to you?"

"Because I'm the man that's got a knife in ya back." He starts to dig the knife deeper into my back and I feel it puncture my skin. I squeeze my eyes shut, preparing for my death. Guess I'm not going to be a photographer in the city then.

Out of the blue I hear a voice say "Hey, what do ya think you're doing?" I open my eyes to see who said that. I take it the voice belongs to a man who's standing across the street, looking at this ordeal. The man is tall and well-built, with black hair. At this point, this is all I can tell.

I feel the pressure off my back and before I can turn around to get a glance at my offender, he's taking off down the street. The guy across the street now takes off across the street, coming towards me. Wait, who the hell is this guy? Not that I'm not grateful that he probably saved my life but still. The guy finally get's across and he stops in front of me, giving me a better look at him. I was correct about his built and height. When I look up at him, I find myself staring into his incredibly blue eyes. Woah, his eyes are... wow, just wow. I shake my head slightly to get out of the daze.

"Are you ok? Did he hurt you?" The strange man asks me.

"I'm fine he just had a knife in my lower back, may I ask who the hell you are?" The man's eyes narrow for a second.

"Don Flack, New York detective. I have to make a call for a minute. Stay here please." Now I have a name for the face, and a job too. You know, Only I would manage to get held at knifepoint and a cop manages to come to rescue, just my luck.

I watch the man, now known as Flack step away a few feet and pull out his phone. He quickly dials a number before putting it to his ear.

"Hey Mac, It's Flack. I just stopped a man grabbing a woman at knifepoint down the street from Joe's convenience store, might want to come over and get her processed and see if she can give a sketch of the man." He listens for a minute before speaking.

"I'll stay with her until you and Stella get here. See ya then." He puts the phone back then walks back over to me.

"Can I get your name please?" Flack asks in a thick New york accent. I'm going to take a wild guess and say he's from New York, it's just a shot in the dark though.

"Annabel Stevens." I tell Flack, who just nods.

"And I take it you're not from New York Mrs. Stevens?"

"What the hell does that have to do with..." I motion with my hands "this?"

"Well, New yorkers would have either A stayed in side because they're smart, or B beat the crap out of the guy. So tell me, where you from?"

"Tulsa, Oklahoma."

"Second question, what the hell gave you the idea to walk the streets of New York at 10:00 at night?" I mean I get this guy's a detective but come on!

"Does it matter detective?" I snapped at him.

"Ok, just asking." He backed off slightly. I open my mouth to respond when A car pulls up with Police lights pull up to the street. A man and a women get out of the car, Who I assume to be the Mac and Stella flack was talking about earlier. Both of them walk up to me.

"Maim I'm detective Mac Taylor and that's Stella Bonasera. Your name is?" Mac Taylor speaks to me, his voice professional.

"It's Annabel Stevens."

"Well, Mrs Stevens If you follow Mrs Bonasera so she could get your story that'd be great." I look over at Stella who gives me a smile and motions me to follow her. This is going to be a long night.

So, I wanna know what did you guys think? Hopefully you guys liked it :) It's my first time writing fanfiction so hopefully I did good


	2. Chapter 2

**The New York Detective That Complicated My Life**

I walk a few feet away with Stella until we stop near the squad car her and Mac and arrived in. She looks at me as she takes out a flashlight from what I assume to be her crime scene kit. She turns towards me and gives me a soft smile.

"So, Mrs..."

"Please, it's Annabel."

"Annabel, would you like to tell me what happened tonight?" Stella asks, turning the flashlight on and shining it on me and over my body, checking for I assume to be possible injuries.

"I was in my house when I decided to pick up a few things at the convenience store down the street."

"If you don't mind me asking, what were you picking up?" Detective Bonasera asks.

"I went to go get some ice cream." She raises an eyebrow, before laughing lightly.

"One of those days huh?" She asks.

"You have no idea."

"So, what happened next?"

"I was walking down the street and I kept getting the feeling I was being watched, but I chose to ignore it. Then when I started to continue to go down the street, someone had come up from behind me and stuck a knife in my lower back."

"I need to take a look at your lower back please." Obliging, I turned around and lifted up my Jacket and shirt to show my lower back. She shines the light on my lower back and she looks at it.

"It's not too bad, he just punctured the skin and drew a little blood that's all. Ok, so what happened after that?"

"He asked me to give him money in which I refused by saying I had no money. He thought I was lying to him. Right as he started to dig the knife into my back, is when the Detective over there had asked what was going on, which scared the guy off and he took off towards the opposite direction I was heading."

"I would head the other direction if I was on Detective Flack's bad side. So did he ask if you were ok, and did he identify himself?"

"Yes Detective Bonasera he did all of those, and that's when he called you guys."

"Ok, thank you. You can head over to Detectives Taylor and Flack now." She smiles before I walk back towards them. When I reach the two, Detective Taylor turns his eyes on me.

"Mrs. Stevens, even though you gave Detective Bonasera your story your going to have to come down to the police station first thing in the morning to file a full report. The sooner you do the sooner the guy that did this to you can be behind bars."

"Ok, I'll see you guys tomorrow." I begin to walk down the street when I hear footsteps trying to keep up with me. I turn around to see Detective Flack behind me.

"Did I forget something detective?" I ask him and I adjust my stance slightly.

"No, I just figured I could walk you back to your place, don't want this guy coming back." That's... sweet but still I think I can walk back.

"Not that I don't appreciate the measure because I do but I think I can walk to my place, it's right down the street."

"Mrs Stevens, I'm not going to be taking no for an answer on this one so we might as well get walking." He motions for me to start walking. Sighing, I start walking ahead of him slightly. In a matter of seconds, he's walking by my side.

"So, what made you want to move to New York from Oklahoma, if I'm not mistaken it's quite different from New York." I give him a look and he just smirks.

"What? Just making small talk." He said defensively. The rest of the walk to my place is silent, just the sound of our footsteps hitting the sidewalk. When we reach my place, I stop in my tracks in front of it.

"This is it, thanks for walking me back Detective." I say before walking up the steps. As I have my hand on the doorknob for the entry way, He get's my attention.

"Yeah detective?"

"You can call me by my last name right, it's not toxic." I smile slightly.

"I think I'm good with Detective for now." I turn the knob and enter, but before I close the door I hear him say "Goodnight Annabel." Shaking my head, I climb the two flights of stairs to get to my place. I unlock my door and head inside shutting the door behind me. I take off my shoes then check my phone. 2 missed calls from Tony, ohhh shit. He hates it when I miss his calls cause he thinks I have a gun to my head. Well, it wasn't a gun and it wasn't at my head. Quickly, I pick up the phone and call Tony. He picks almost immediately.

"Hey Tony." I start out.

"Ohh thank god, you didn't call me back. I thought you were dead. I was half tempted to go down to new York and find you." He says in his thick Boston Drawl. He's lived in Boston for 6 years and he has the accent down pat.

"I can assure you Tony I'm perfectly fine, I just... got caught up in something, I just got home in fact." If he were to find out what happened, he would be scared enough to have three heart attacks.

"Ohh yeah. What were you doing that you just got back from?" He asks me.

"I... took a walk. See if I can get any good pictures of New York nature at night."

"The things you'll do to get photos."

"That's the dream man." I smile as I head towards my bedroom.

"Well, I should let you go. Have to get that beauty sleep you so desperately don't need."

"Thanks Tony, I'll talk to you soon. Night." I hang up, then I put my phone on my bedside table. I change into a shirt and sweat pants, then pull back the covers on my bed. I climb into my bed, then pull the covers up to my chin. As I slowly drift off to sleep, the events of the night are running through my head. Hopefully, this whole ordeal is over soon.

So, I hope you guys liked this chapter as much as the first one :) the next one you'll be introduced to the rest of the CSI team :)


	3. Chapter 3

**The New York Detective That Complicated My Life**

I wake up the next morning, feeling oddly rested for what had happened last night. It's not every day someone goes out to get ice cream and ends up getting grabbed at knife point. I'm just lying in bed, staring up at the ceiling when it hits me. I have to go into the department and report what happened.

Groaning, I roll out of bed and walk over to my closet where I manage to change my sweat pants to jeans before my phone goes off. Running over from my closet to my phone, I answer it.

"Hello?" I ask, out of breath.

"Yes, Ms. Stevens, this is Detective Taylor from last night. I called to remind you that you need to come in and report this, unless you don't want to." No, I don't want to report it. I'm just going to leave it as it is.

"Yes, of course I still want to. I was just getting ready to leave to..." I'm in the middle of saying that, I trip on a shoe, sending me flying to the ground. I grunt as I hit the ground.

"Ms. Stevens, are you ok?" Taylor asks me.

"Yeah, I just tripped on something," I pause as I get up off the floor "but, I just moved here not too long ago so I don't know where the building is at." I tell Detective Taylor truthfully as I make my way to my closet again.

"I will send a Detective out to your address." Feeling that I shouldn't argue, I relay my address to Taylor.

"We'll see you shortly." He says curtly then hangs up. Great going Annabel, you trip and fall while on the phone with a Detective. Awesome way to embarrass yourself. Shaking my head, I open my closet doors and grab my Boston red socks shirt that my cousin Tony got me several years back. I put that one then make my way into my living room to check my email for the usual jobs. Nothing. Just as I sign out of my computer, there's a knock on the door.

"Yeah?" I ask, hoping the person on the end answers.

"It's Detective Flack from last night. Mac- I mean Detective Taylor sent me over to take you to the station." Of course, Flack's here! Mr. I'm going to walk ya home and take no for an answer.

Biting down on my tongue to keep myself from saying anything, I walk over to the door and open it. Detective Flack is wearing a suit similar to the one he was wearing last night.

He looks at me then the t-shirt and his eyes widen.

"What?" I ask, being self-conscious about what I look like.

"Are you wanting to get yourself killed?" Flack asks me.

"Excuse me?" I ask him, my voice getting higher pitched.

"Your shirt. The Yankees and the Red Socks have a HUGE rivalry. They've had it for years." He explains eyeing my shirt again.

"Fine, I'll grab a jacket." I mutter some incoherent words under my breath as I walk inside to grab a jacket.

"What was that?" I hear ask. With the jacket in my hand, I snap around to glare at him. He smiles as I glare at him, walking and putting the jacket at the same time.

"Let's just get this over with." I say as we walk down the two flight of stairs to get outside. Once outside, Flack leads me to a black truck of some sort. I go to open the passenger side door but Flack has it already opened.

"Really?"

"What can I say, I was raised right. Now get in." Shaking my head, I get in and he closes the door behind me. He gets into the truck and pulls away from the house. Resting my head on the window, I just past the time looking at our surroundings that we pass by. In no time in it all, we arrive there. In all actuality, it's been 20 minutes. When we pull up in front of the Police department, I get out-and-out front is another man, who I assume is another detective due to the badge.

This man has blonde hair that is slightly spiked towards the top and glasses, with grayish eyes underneath the glasses. He's wearing a simple green t-shirt with blue jeans and his badge clipped to the belt of his pants. The man now looks towards me, but not at me. Then I realise, he's probably looking at Detective Flack behind me.

"What Flack? Can't pick up enough girls off the clock so you need to pick some up while your on the job?" The man smiles at Flack.

"Can it Messer." Flack says. Even though I couldn't see him, i could tell in the tone of his voice that he has a smile on his face.

"Whatever you say." This Messer guy responds then goes back into the police department. Without any word, Flack leads me inside the department and once I get into the main area, the smell of sweat, dirt, and coffee hit me. The smell doesn't bother me though seeing that I grew up on a farm in Tulsa. As my eyes search the room, I spot Detective Taylor and some other guy I haven't met coming towards me. This one is African-American with closely shaved hair towards his head.

When the reach me, Detective Taylor offers a small smile. "Ms. Stevens, thank you for coming down. We appreciate you taking time to do this. This right here is Dr. Sheldon Hawkes. Him and I will be taking your statement and if willing, DNA and fingerprints for future referencing." I nod my head to give approval for the DNA and fingerprints.

"Excellent, Flack we've got this from here." I look back at Flack to see him nod his head and walk away off towards a deeper part of the department. Looking back at Detective Taylor and Hawkes, they motion me to sit down at a nearby desk.

"Mrs. Stevens, is there anything about the man you remember?" Dr. Hawkes asks.

"I remember that he smelled like a mixture of alcohol and cigarettes." Detective Taylor nods his head before writing down something in a notebook/pad.

"Is there anything else you can tell us about? Anything can help us catch this guy." Detective Taylor asks me.

"When he spoke to me, he had a accent. Not a New York accent though, it sounded like he came from the west coast. Other than that, I can't tell you anything else about him."

Dr. Hawkes and Detective Taylor stand up, so I follow suit.

Both Hawkes and The Detective take cards out of their jacket pockets.

"If you happen to remember anything at all, give one of us a call." I take the cards from both of them.

"Thank you." I nod my head and begin to walk out of the department. Once Outside, I was going to take a cab and go home but as a rash decision, I start walking straight ahead remembering that I saw a park up the road.

(Somewhere in the Police Department)

Detective Messer and Flack are looking out a window, watching Annabel walk up the street.

"I give your girl credit man, she's got guts to walk down the streets after being grabbed at knife point." Messer comments to Flack.

"Danny she's not my girl, but yeah she does." Flack sighs before walking away.

"Flack, where are you going?" Danny asks.

"Make sure she doesn't do anything stupid." Flack responds without turning his back.

"I thought she wasn't your girl?" Messer asks.

"She's not." Flack responds.

Sorry with the long hiatus, had a lot of stuff going on with school ending and not. Now since it's summer, I'll be updating a lot more :) so do you guys like it so far?


	4. Chapter 4

**The New York Detective That Complicated My Life**

I walked down the street, the wind whipping my hair around my face. To slightly block the wind, I pull the collar up on my jacket so it some what guards my face. As I continue to make my way towards the park, I hear the sound of fastly approaching steps. Feeling that it's another attacker, I quicken my pace.

"Annabel hold up!" Detective Flack calls out. I stop dead in my tracks. Does this guy have an obsession with me, cause it's starting to piss me off. I snap around to glare at him.

"Why are you following me Detective?" I ask, gritting my teeth slightly.

"Look," He begins to push through many people coming from the opposite direction to get closer to me. "I saw you walking down the street and I thought since what happened with last night, you wouldn't want to be walking alone."

"Not that I don't appreciate the offer, but I think I'm good." I nod at him. All he does is shake is head and dig a card of his pocket. Seriously, what the hell is up with people giving me their cards. He sticks the card in my hand.

"That's my card, my cell's on back so if you need anything, just call me." I cock my head to the right slightly hopefully to convey that I don't understand this at all. He seems to miss that though.

"Nice seeing you." He smiles slightly before walking back down the street the way he came. I pull my eyes away from him to look at the card in my hand. I raise my hand up closer to my face so I can see the card.

_Don Flack_

_New York city Detective_

_Desk number: 647-784-2245_

I turn the card over to see that his cell number is of course written on the back of the card in black ink. Stuffing the card in my pocket, I continue my way to the park we had passed. Within 5 minutes or so, I come across a small park on the left side hand of the road. I walk into the park and begin strolling through.

Dead center of the park is a beautiful clear lake, which is rare in New York. The sun reflects perfectly off the surface of the pond. Taking out my phone, I begin to set up to take a picture with what I have. As I step back to get a better shot of the pond, I step backwards onto a rock, causing me to trip and fall backwards.

There, again I show myself being a freaking clutz. I look over at my arm and see a cut that blood is coming out of. That definitely looks sexy. As I assess my other body parts, I notice multiple bruises and cuts, but nothing is as bad as what I have on my arm. I get up and when I check the ground to see if I dropped anything, when I see a point sticking out of the soil that looks like... a nose? What the fuck?

Bending down, I uncover the dirt on the 'nose' and when all the dirt is off the object, I do see that it in fact is a nose. Holy shit. I keep digging where I see the nose sticking up and soon enough I find the cheek, bones, chin and lips. When I finally uncover, that's when it finally hits me; I found a dead body.

For some reason, I start to cry and my breathing gets more labored. Shit, what do I do?

I fish around for my phone and find it then dig the first card out of my pocket, which just happens to Flack's card. Shakily, I dial the number on my phone and press call, then put the phone to my ear. It rings for a few seconds before he answers.

"Detective Flack." He says somewhat professionally.

"Flack... it's Annabel." I say, trying to not cry while on the phone with him.

"Well, you just called me by my last name. I think that's a major victory in my books." He responds. I don't say anything back because I'm to busy sobbing slightly over the dead body I just found.

He I think picks up on my hesitation because he responds rather quickly. "Annabel, what's going on? Are you ok?" He starts asking.

"Flack I just... I found..." I try to tell him but my voice keeps cracking.

"Annabel, it's ok. Everything's going to be fine. Just tell me, what did you find?" He asks, desperation peeking through now.

"I just found a dead body in the park."

I know I left it at a weird spot but don't worry, cliff hanger will be solved soon enough :)


	5. Chapter 5

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

It takes awhile for Flack to respond, and in the mean time I'm trying to slow my breathing down slightly.

"I'm sorry Annabel but did you just say you found a dead body?" He asks. I don't know if he's asking out of doubt or shock but either way, it causes me to break down slightly.

"What, don't believe me Flack?" My voice almost goes out.

"No, I believe you. Now what park are you at?" He questions me rather quickly.

"Is right down the street from the Department, left hand side of road." I choke out as I wipe my eyes.

"All right, we'll be there shortly. Annabel stay there, I mean it." The last part of it sounded angry but I didn't want to ask questions about it. He hung up right after that. I close the phone and stuck it in my pocket. I try to stand up, but my knees currently have the consistency of jello so I go straight back down.

So as of now, I sitting next to the rock that cut my arm. I sit there for a good 5 minutes before I hear the slight skidding of car tires. I look up and sure enough, Flack came along with two other officers. Stella and Danny follow closely behind.

Flack spots me and walks over to me. When he gets to me, he ends up having to look down at me.

"Hey Annabel, where's the body?" He asks with his intense blue eyes locked onto mine. All I do is point to the face that I dug up. He looks in that direction and nods his head. He then turns his head towards me.

"You realise I'm going to have to get your story." I nod my head as I've finally began to calm down. When I lift my head slightly, Danny and Stella have finally made their way over.

"Wow Flack, she is not having much luck." All Flack does is elbow Danny in the ribs slightly. Stella shakes her head as she brings her kit over to the body.

"There's blood on this rock near the victim's body, could be their's or the killers."

"That's actually my blood." They all give me questioning looks.

"I tripped over the rock, and that's when I saw her nose sticking out of the ground slightly." I finally manage to get up, but the minute I do Flack starts asking questions.

"Woah, where do you think your going? We still need your story." He asks.

"Ok here it is. I went to take a picture of the lake, stepped back to get a better view when I tripped over that rock walking backwards, cutting my arm. That's when I looked over and saw what I thought was a nose sticking out of the ground. I dug until I saw the face, then I called you. How bout that for a story?" I respond, my Oklahoma accent getting thick.

Flack opens his mouth when Stella speaks up. "Hey Ms. Stevens can you come over here for a minute." I walk over to her where she waiting a few feet away from the body.

"I apologise for Detective Flack, he can be a little... forward sometimes. Ms. Stevens is it ok if I get a blood sample, just to make sure that blood on the rock is yours?"

"Yeah." Turning to side, I allow her to take a swab and pick up some blood dripping down my arm. She quickly collects it, and turns back to her kit.

"If you told Detective Flack your story, you can go home." Nodding my head, I being to turn around when Stella gets my attention again.

"Yeah?" I ask her.

"I'm sorry you had to go through this, no one should have to be the one to discover a dead body." She gives me a smile, which I find myself returning.

"Thanks, means a lot." I finally turn around and walk out of the park entrance. I look both ways down the street and see a local bus station so I head down to the bus station where one other person is. I sit next to them on the bench when my phone rings. I don't even bother looking at the caller ID when I answer it.

"Hello?" I ask, slightly annoyed that people can't leave me alone.

"It's Flack. Annabel, where'd you go?"

"Bus station down the street, why do you care?"

"I was just wondering." Then he hangs up rather suddenly. Well, that wasn't weird at all. I shake my head for what seems like the thousandth time today. I get pretty involved with the street across from me when the person at the bus stop with me who is an older woman speaks up.

"There's a young man coming over here, and he's look right at you." That get's my attention. I snap my head around to see Flack coming towards here. Ohh wonderful, I can't even escape to my home without him following me.

I launch up from the bench and prepare to run when he goes "Ohh you're not bolting on me this time." He motions for me to sit back down, and grudgingly I do so. He sits right next to me, and when I say right next to me, I mean RIGHT next to me. Literally, he leaves barely any breathing room. I'm sitting so close to him that my knee is pressed up against his thigh.

"May I ask why your here?" I lower my voice slightly so the lady next to me can't here the conversation. When I turn to look at her, she gets up off the bench and walks away. Thanks, now I'm alone with him.

"Well I'm not out pan handling that's for sure..." He isn't afraid to throw a smile in there.

"Where are you heading?"

"Wherever it is your going." I raise my eyebrows as I look at him.

"Look, after what happened with the other night and what happened today, I don't exactly think it's safe for you to be alone, so for the rest of the day. I'm keeping a close watch on you." He looks at me.

"I have to ask you this but why are you doing this? Has you've done this with anybody else in the situation?"

"No, I definitely haven't done this with any other person in your situation."

"Then why me? Why start now?" He starts looking at me that could make an ice-cube melt before his hand brushes my knee. What is going on?

"Well for starters..." He begins to speak but he's interrupted by his phone going off. He quickly unclips it from his belt.

"Yeah? Ok Stella, you want me to take her back home? Ok, I understand now. I'll see you later." He shuts his phone before clipping it back to his belt. Flack stands up from the bench an sticks out his hand slightly.

"What are you doing?" I question him.

"Stella wants me to drive you on home, said it's for safety reason and the fact that you should never ride a bus in new york." He continues to have his hand stuck out.

"I got this..." I stand up rather shaky, and end up tripping into Flack's chest. He grabs my upper arms to steady me. Ok, awkward...

Haha I finally had Flannabel happen (that's what I'm calling them til I can come up with a better name) First cliffhanger and hope you love (hate) it and the rest of the chapter :)


	6. Chapter 6

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

When I look up at Flack, he still has a hold on my upper arms. For a minute, I find myself just looking up at him, not moving. He seems to be just looking down at me. His grip on my upper arms loosens, but stays.

Suddenly, I clear my throat and look away causing Flack to drop his grip on my arms.

"Thanks for umm... offering to drive me home." I say awkwardly. Who wouldn't feel awkward after what happened?

"No problem." He responds, then begins walking back down the street. Quick question, how the hell is he not fazed by this? Cause I sure as hell am!

Shaking my head, I start to follow Flack and he leads me to the same car he had driven me to the department. This time though, I manage to open up the passenger door and get in before he reaches the car door. Maybe it's that I really want to get the hell out of this situation.

When he finally reaches the car, he's staring at me, then he shakes his head then get's into the car himself. He starts the car and drives of without another word, which for one I'm glad for. If he had wanted to have a conversation, I would've just died. Thankfully, the ride to my place has been uneventful and silent.

When he pulls up outside of my place, I go to grab the door handle, when he grabs my arm, but drops it.

"Wait Annabel." Ohh great, conversation time.

"Yeah?" I swallow as I let go of the door handle.

"Well first, can you look at me?" I turn my gaze from the window of the car door to him. He get's this look in his eyes that I can't place. Is it just me but are his eyes getting darker? I'm just imagining it, right? "Look, what happened back there, I don't want things to be awkward between us."

"Awkward? What would make you think things are going to be awkward? " I ask, getting slightly nervous.

"I don't know, the fact that you were in the car faster than we could count to five. How about that you wouldn't talk to me." I get another good look at his eyes and see that his mood has changed, completely. Don't ask me how I know that just by looking at his eyes.

"Things aren't going to be awkward, don't worry about it." I try to calm him down. I guess it works because a smile finds its way on his face.

I reach for the door handle and open the car door this time. I get out of the car and close the door. I'm walking up the steps of my place when Flack calls out "I'll call you." I snap around. How the hell did he get my number?

"Remember? You called me to tell me you found a body?" He reminds me, a chuckle in his voice. Ohh yeah, wow how could I forget that?

I just shake my head as I continue to walk the steps as he calls out "Try not to find any more bodies!" Ignoring him, I finally get inside my building.

Climbing the two sets of stairs that I love doing everyday, I finally get to my place. Opening the door, I take my coat off and close the door behind me as I enter. I throw my coat over a near by chair before making my way to my bathroom to take a shower that I ever so need.

When I get under the spray of the shower, I let it erase the dirt and the disgusting feeling the covers my body. I wonder if this is the feeling you get when you discover my body.

I finally get out of the shower after god knows how long and change into sweat pants before my phone rings. I check the called I.D somewhat afraid that it's Flack. It reads Tony, my cousin and I answer.

"Hey Tony.." I answer as I walk over to the couch.

"Annabel, you ok? I was reading news on the computer today and it said they found a body in new york in a park that's close to your place." Great. Should I just leave out the part that I found the body? Yeah, I'll just leave it out.

"Yeah I'm fine, I don't even know who that is."

"Ok, good just making sure you were ok." A knock on the door interrupts our conversation.

"Well I thank you for checking in on me." I smile as get up off the couch and go towards the door. When I look through the peep-hole of my door and see Flack standing there. What the fuck?

"Tony, I'm going to have to have to call you back." I don't even bother to hear his response as I hang up then stick the phone in my pocket. I undo the lock on my door and open to See Flack standing there, in casual clothes. He's wearing a simple red t-shirt that's tighter in the upper arm area, with jeans and aviator glasses with black lenses. I try to let my eyes wander to his arms, but the shirt puts his upper arm muscles on display.

"What are you doing?" I ask, forcing my eyes to look back up at his face.

"I was going to call you and ask this, but I figured I'd do it in person. Annabel, I was wondering if you wanted to go out and get a drink with me tonight?" He asks. I would look into his eyes to see his emotion but I can't see his eyes.

"I don't know..."

"Come on, it won't be that bad..." He looks at me while the corner of his mouth turns up in a grin.

"Fine give me a couple of minutes." I walk away from the door, Wordlessly inviting him in. I look back and he comes into my place before shutting the door.

"I'll be out in a minute." I call as I go into my bedroom. When I get in, I close the door behind me. I'm going out with Flack tonight, oh god.

Ok so I decided to call them Annack, because it sounds amazeballs :D anyways, Flack asked Annabel out, so again FINALLY ANNACK! Lol anyways next chapter will be them out :)


	7. Chapter 7

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

Why, why am I going out with him tonight? Whatever I said yes for, must not have consulted with my brain, because Now I'm doing something I don't want to do. Wait, what am I even going to be wearing? Ohh great, so many decisions.

Walking over to my closet, I put on my favorite pair of blue jeans with a simple white top and my brown leather jacket. I grab my shoes when as I'm walking and trying to put them on at the same time and I trip and on my face. Seriously, what the hell is with me and tripping near or talking to a detective?

"Everything ok in their Annabel?" Flack asks, I can tell he's on the edge of laughter. I walk over to the bedroom door, and open it, brushing my hair out of my face.

"I'm good." I look in Flack's direction and he's leaning against my kitchen counter. With his sunglasses still on, he looks at me. He quickly gives me a once over before walking away from the counter and towards me.

"You look great. You ready to go?" He asks me as he finally takes off his sunglasses.

"Thanks, and yeah I'm ready." I say the first part somewhat nervously. Wow, your nervous after a 'you look great'? What the hell Annabel?

"Then let's go. I know this bar and grill down the street that's wonderful and it's a nice night so I figured we could walk there." He opens my door for me and I walk out. He follows me and closes the door. I then lock the door.

"Wait, I thought you said to not walk around New York City at night?" I ask him as we walk down the two sets of stairs and then walk outside and onto the sidewalk.

"I did, but I said not to do it alone. Besides, no one's going to do anything to you while I'm here." He gives me a 'dont mess with it' look. Flack puts his hand on my lower back, but drops it quickly afterwards. The rest of the walk down the street is in silence. Minutes later, we come up on Dusty's Bar and Grill. I walk to open the door to the bar and grill but again Flack opens the door for me. Shaking my head, I enter the building and this time, Flack isn't hesitant to rest his hand on my lower back and lead me towards a table. As he's leading me towards a table, I feel alot of the men at the bar, just watching me carefully as if Flack might disappear at any moment and the other men might have a chance with me. I have a feeling he senses this because he drops his hand on my back and slides his arm along my shoulders, and brings me up against him.

"I saw the way you freaked out over the looks, this is for that." He whispers in my ear, his lips practically brushing against my ear. Ok, that's incredibly sweet, and slightly awkward. He continues to lead me towards a table that's slightly way from the center of the room. We reach the table and he slides a chair out for me to sit down, in which I do. He pushes the chair before leaning down to whisper in my ear again.

"Just relax." He picks up his head and goes to sit down across from me at the table. Even though we're away from the main part of the place, there are still one or two men staring at me.

"So Annabel..." Flack brings me out of wherever my mind was heading.

"Yeah?"

"What's your story? Who is Annabel Stevens?" He asks. Is this is somewhat subtle way of asking more about me.

"Well as you already know, I grew up in Oklahoma. Lived on a farm for my entire life growing up until I moved into the more populated area when I was 19. Went to college for Photography."

"What about your parents?" He asks as if he has pure intrest in knowing.

"My parents..." I laugh slightly "My father was a preacher at a local church, still is til this day. He's hardcore Catholic, which believe me was very awkward in high school when I started dating."

"Your kidding right?" He asks in shock.

"Nope."

"Man, I wouldn't want to be a guy you knew in highschool."

"No kidding, I had brought a guy home after a date and my dad was telling him and me how 'we were going to go to hell. My mom though, was much more laid back. Was the type of women who would buy boxes of hair dye when she started going gray hated to admit, she was getting older. Now though, she's 57 and is enjoying being her age." I stop when the waitress brings us each a drink, but we didn't order. She then quickly walks away to tend to another table.

"Any brothers or sisters?"

"No, but I think of my Cousin Tony as my brother because we practically grew up together. He lives in Boston now and let's just say he Didn't want me moving out here."

"Understandable. I have a little sister Sam, and if we didn't live here already. I wouldn't want her moving here either." Flack smiles as he takes a drink. "Speaking which, why did you move to New york in the first place? He asks. I take a sip of the drink the waitress brought me before answering.

"New york city's the place for dreams and I wanted to be a photographer. The thing is, it's not working out. I haven't found any photography jobs or any other jobs for that matter. My money's going fast and I have none coming in. In a few months if I don't get money coming in, which I don't want to have to go home with nothing left." I look down at the table.

"I'm sure you'll find something. After all, New York is where dreams come true." He gives me a smile. I go to smile back when My eye catches a man at the bar that's been watching us since we stepped in. He just stares at me and it has me worrying what he's thinking about.

Flack notices I'm not looking at him anymore so he turns around slightly to look at man. He just shakes his head as puts some money on the table.

"Annabel, wait by the entrance for me. I'll be right there."

"Wait by the entrance? Why?"

"Just go I'll be right behind you." I stand up from my chair and slowly start walking towards the entrance. Once I am out of view from the table, I turn around and look at the bar, having a feeling Flack is going to do something about it. Sure enough he's going to because he get's up from his seat and walk towards the man, but right before he reaches him he 'accidently' trips, falling into the man and causing him to spill his drink.

"Sorry about that man..." Flack apologises, but by the look on the man's face he knows this was a setup. I can bsrely hear this but I hear Flack say to the man "Next time, try not to stare at her and fucking creeping her out ok?" He gives the man a pat before turning towards the entrance, this is when I continue walking towards the entrance And I make in just enough time as he's turning the corner I was at when I hit the entrance.

I walk out of the bar and grill and hit the streets of new york with him literally at my side. We silently start walking down the street and I speak up after a minute or so.

"You didn't have to do that it there. It's not even my fault there looking at me." Flack gives me a sideways glance.

"No it's definetly not your fault." With that, we continue walking until we hit outside my place. He turns towards me.

"Annabel, you know how you were saying you couldn't find a job?"

"Yeah."

"Well I may have something for you." Say what? He's kidding right?

"Are you serious Flack?"

"Yeah, I've been thinking about it and I remember that my friend whose in real estate needs a person with a photography background to photograph the houses he own and pictures of the inside so he can sell the houses online." Oh my god, he's not kidding. "I'll call him and give him your number."

"Oh my god, thank you." Without thinking, I wrap my arms around his neck and hug him. He's startled at first, but it doesn't take him long to return it.

"No problem Annabel." I pull away and I very suddenly, I kiss Flack. Holy shit what am I doing. I pull away as quickly as I went in. When I look at Flack he's still in shock slightly.

"Annabel what was..." before he answers, I walk inside to my building. And as I'm climbing the flights of stairs, I hear him calling after me, but I ignore him calling me.


	8. Chapter 8

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

When I finally get into my place, I go to lay on the couch and stare up at the ceiling. What. The. Fuck? Why in god's name did I kiss him? I mean, I understand the hug because it was thanking for the job but the kiss? It was like my sanity went out the window for a minute. Even know I have no clue why I did it, I have to admit it wasn't half bad. Sure he wasn't reciprocating it but still... and god what am I saying? I barely even know the guy and I freaking kissed him. Even if I were to have feelings for him which I don't, how would I even know that he felt the same way.

I begin to close my eyes when my phone rings.

"Yeah?" I ask.

"Hello is this Annabel Stevens?" A man asks.

"Yes, may I ask who this is?" I respond with curiosity in my voice.

"This Anthony Hodgkin of Hodgkin Real estate. Don Flack had recommended you for the job opening we have." Wow, he called them that quickly.

"Oh yes." We talked for several minutes and before he hung up he told me to send him some pictures to his email that he gave me so he could make a decision on whether or not to hire me. Yes! This could be it, my big break. It's not long after that, that I get another phone call.

"Hello?" I ask, more chipper then I suspected.

"Well someone sounds happy." Stella muses. Wow, I did not expect her to call me.

"It's a long story, anyways what's up?" I sit up on my couch now.

"I was wondering if you wanted to half a late breakfast with me tomorrow." She asks me.

"I would love to." I respond.

"All right then, just me at the Department Detective Flack took you to at around 11:00 and we'll walk down the street to a great café that has the best eggs in the city." She tells me as I begin to get up from the couch.

"Sounds like a plan." I make my way to the Bedroom.

"All right, I'll see you then." When I hang up, I immediately climb into bed because with all that has happen, I am extremely tired. Hopefully tomorrow will be less interesting.

When I wake up the next morning, I look over at my clock and it says 10. Guess I should get dressed. I get up out of my and walk over to my closet where I put on a white sundress and I got a few weeks ago and a pair of brown sandals. I then quickly brush my hair and put on a little blush. I then grab my phone and a jean jacket to go over the dress then lock up my place.

After I get down the two flights of stairs and outside, i hail a cab and give him the address of the department. When he get's there, I pay him then get out and check the time on my phone. 10:55, perfect timing. I walk into the building and the same smell hits me as the first time I walked in here.

When I get to the area where all the other desks are, I spot Stella across the room as she does the same.

"I'll be ready in a minute I just have to tie up a few loose ends." She smiles before walking away. I go to lean against a desk when I hear a voice.

"Annabel?" Flack asks. I turn to see who's sitting at the desk and sure enough its Flack, back in a suit and tie.

"Ohh I didn't see you their detective." His facial expression changes when I say detective.

"Why are you acting different towards me?"

"I'm not acting different towards you, I don't know what you are talking about." Hopefully, If I play innocent, I can slide this past him.

"Like hell you are!" His voice is getting more angry. Guess innocence isn't going to work. "You reverted from my Flack to detective and you're trying to act innocent when you know damn well what happened last night." And I think I got him angry.

"I never had..." He stands up from his chair so he's towering over me. He lowers his voice when he speaks. "Bullcrap ok? I know you know that you kissed me last night, and you're trying to deny it happened. I wanna talk about this, now." Just as I open my mouth, Stella comes back out.

"You ready Annabel?" She asks.

"Yeah." I step away from Flack and walk towards Stella.

"Then let's go." Before I follow her outside, I look back at Flack and he's practically glaring at me. I then quickly follow Stella outside. As we take a left and start walking down the street, Stella begins to ask questions.

"What was going on between you and Flack?" She asks.

"Some had... happened yesterday and I... may or may have not overreacted at something and he wants an explanation." I try to be vague because hopefully being vague means she will get the hint I want her to leave it alone.

"Someone's being vague. Come on, girl to girl tell me what happened. I promise I won't tell." She finishes saying as she turns left into an outdoor café. We sit down at an outdoor table when a waiter comes to our table. We both order scrambled eggs and toast.

"Fine, I kissed Flack last night after we went out for drinks and after he told me he could get me a job, and I sort of been acting different towards him, and he wants to talk about why I did what I did." She widens her eyes ever so slightly. Our orders arrive and we go back to the conversation.

"Well, I'd want an explanation to, the least he deserves is an explanation why you did what he did."

"Yeah, but he was extremely angry. And he still probably is." I respond then start eating my eggs.

"Again, I would be too. Hell, you'd be lucky if I didn't shoot you with my gun."

"I don't know maybe for a minute I may need to just step away from him while I think about all of this.." We finish the rest of our meals in small talk and then when we're finished we part ways. I take a cab back to my place. After I climb the sets of stairs and stand outside my front door, I just get the feeling that somethings not right. I open the door cautiously and as I step in, I see that there was nobody in there. When I put my coat on the rack and turn around to shut the door, Flack is standing in the hall. I knew something felt weird!

"What the hell are you doing here?" I ask him as I walk inside.

"I said we were going to be talking about this and damn it were going to talk about it." He slightly pushes me inside then walks in himself. He then almost slams the door closed.

"Now tell me, why have you been treating me differently, as if didn't want what happened last night?" Just listen to Stella's advice.

"I did what I thought was best."

"And you thought kissing me, then walking inside and leaving me alone outside with no answers was best? I'd hate to see the worst idea. Wait in fact, I did experience the worst which was that." I'm silent after that statement. He sighs and I can tell some of the anger has lifted from him as he takes a few steps towards me.

"You don't know I felt last night after you left me there, with nothing. I thought for hours I did something wrong, that you regretted what you did. I felt horrible. I just want to know why." I bow my head slightly as I feel tears coming in my eyes. Why does he have to be so god damn sweet right now.

"Honestly Flack, I can't answer that. I wish I could." I raise my head to look into his blue eyes and a tear slips down my cheek. His face softens when he looks at me.

"That wasn't suppose to make you cry."

"Don't worry about it." I tell him as I raise my right hand to wipe my eyes, but he catches it before he reaches my eye.

"I'm going to worry about, ok? So I'm not dropping this." He drags me into him with my hand. Once my face is pressed against his shoulder, more tears escape my eyes. He wraps his arms around me to hold me against him.

"It's ok, everything's worked out. We're good. Everything's fine." He tries his best to calm me down, which works slightly. He pulls me away from me only to rest his forehead against.

"I want to give this us a shot, see what happens. Please don't run away from me this time." As he pulls away, I kiss him except this time, not even a second passes before he kisses me back.

I pull away this, slower. I look him dead in the eye as I say "I'm not running away this time."

For the first time since last night, he smiles.

"Good." And then he leans down slightly to seal our lips together.

Yes, I finally made Flack and Annabel, but the road is long ahead of us, and hopefully you guys are excited.


	9. Chapter 9

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

After he had kissed me, he left shortly after wards promising that he would see me again. He kissed me before he had left to go back to work. Which when you think about it, it's kind of sweet that he left work and came here just to talk to me. Now that he said it, I want to try us out and see what happens, see where it goes.

After about 10 minutes, I change into a t-shirt and shorts and decide to go for a jog outside while the weather's good. When I put on my running shoes, I grab my phone and stick it my pocket in case of emergencies. I just want to be ready, plus if something happens and I didn't take my phone and Flack somehow finds, I am a dead women.

I run outside my door and then lock it, then sprint down the stairs. When I hit outside, I instantly start running towards the right. It feels good to have your feet pounding the ground as each one hits the ground, the wind whipping around your face. It take me a good 5-10 minutes before I have to stop running. Guess it was a good that I was in track in high school and college.

I bend over to catch my breath, my hand pressed against my ribs. I'm in the middle of taking a breath in when I hear the sound of something hitting medal. I snap up and look behind me, but I don't see anything. I gotta stop being paranoid. As I turn back around, a man stands in front of me.

He has wild brown hair that looks like he doesn't own a comb and his matching brown beard looks the same way. I thought he was homeless but when I got a look at his clothes, they looked like they were freshly ironed and clean and his shoes were nit exactly thrift store material.

"Can I help you?" I ask him. When he speaks his voice is low and demanding.

"Don't scream, just follow me into that alley." I wonder why he's so aggressive. I look down at his hands to see he has a knife in his hands, with the blade pointed towards me. Shit, seriously? I nod but as I go towards the alley, he grabs me by my arm and practically throws me into the alley ahead of him. Then using his body, he pushed me against the brick wall with a hell of a lot of force. He then takes the blade of the knife and rests it up against the face.

"Think I'd let ya go bitch? I am nowhere near finished." He speaks again. Wait, I recognize the voice. That's the same man who grabbed me at knife point on the streets.

"Scream and I'll make the pain a lot worse." He whispers venomously as he starts to dig the knife blade into my cheek and pain hits me like a ton of bricks. I can't help but whimper slightly as he digs it into my cheek. That was a mistake because he takes me body and slams it into the brick wall.

"I said keep quiet." As a result of whimpering he takes his hand and puts it over my mouth as he the knife and makes a cut right above my elbow. Shit, I'm going to die. Out of instinct, I bite down on his hand as hard as I could, I did so until I tasted blood and that's when he yanks his hand away.

"Son of a bitch..." he mutters, I take this opportunity to raise my knee up as hard as I could and connect with his nuts. He grunts, and falls to the floor. I run out of the alley, despite the pain in my back and face. I bolt down the street until I spot an alley with a giant blue garbage can in it so I run behind the side of the can that's facing away from the street and sit up against it, which shoots pain up my back.

Great, wait am I going to do, I can't walk home and I'm stuck in this alley. Wait, I have my phone. I take my phone out of my pocket and hit the redial button, not caring who I ending up calling. They take a few seconds to answer.

"Stella Bonasera." Stella says in the a professional voice. Thank god...

"Stella, it's Annabel." I say, gritting my teeth because of the pain.

"Annabel, what's wrong? You ok?" She asks, voice quickly changing from professional to worried.

"He got me again, the guy that grabbed me at knife point."

"Woah, what happened?" She practically shouts over the phone.

"He threw me into and alley, and took out the knife..." I stop speaking because the pain is huge at this point.

"Ok, stop. You don't need to over exert yourself. You bleeding?"

"Yeah, from my face and my arm." Stella mutters under her breath.

"Where are you, I'm coming to get you."

"I'm down the street from my place. I'm hiding behind a giant blue garbage can in an alley down the street. I think the alley's by a fire hydrant."

"Ok, just stay tight and don't move. Just in case he wants to look for you before we get there, you have to stay silent. I will be right there." She hangs up quickly. With the pain in my arm, I can't even close the phone so I just let it rest in my hand. I put my head against the garbage bin, which adds more pain. I grit my teeth, knowing I can't scream. The blood begins to drip from my face onto my white shorts. It seems like hours pass before I hear the skidding of tires and a car door slamming closed.

"Annabel?" I hear Stella call out.

"Back here." I respond. She rushes over and seconds later she appears in front of me.

"Shit, he got you bad." She sits down in front of me and takes off her jacket. She hold it up to my face to stop the bleeding.

"I called Flack before I left, he'll be here in a few. What else hurts."

"My back from him slamming me against the brick wall a few times."

"Annabel, I know this is going to hurt but I need you to turn around so I can take a look at your back" Nodding my head slightly, I lift my back up off of the garbage bin carefully. Painfully, I turn around to where my back is now facing her.

"I'm going to lift up your shirt now. It most likely is going to be painful." I grit my teeth as she lifts up my shirt.

"Annabel, I hate to say this but your back is covered in bruises." She puts my shirt down and carefully helps me get back to my original position.

"I'm going to call an ambulance, stay right here I'll be back." She quickly gets up and rushes back towards the street. Shortly, I hear another car screeching to a halt and a slamming door.

"Where is she?" I hear Flack practically bark out.

"She's behind the garbage can. Pre warning, he got her pretty good." Flack doesn't even bother walking as he runs until he stops in front of me.

"Oh my god Annabel..." he crouches down in front of me and like Stella, he takes off his jacket except he holds his jacket up to my arm. "I can't believe this son of a bitch got you again."

I say through gritted teeth "Why are you soo angry?" It's normal for him to be angry, but this angry?

"Because this guy hurt you and I wasn't there to stop this." He puts more pressure onto my arm.

"I don't care what the hell you think or what you want, after you get out of the hospital. Your staying with me until this ass hole gets put in jail or killed. There's no way in fucking hell I'm leaving you alone after today." He takes the jacket off my arm and sets it down on the ground. He brings his hand up to my face and touches his fingers against where he had dug the knife in my face. I wince as his fingers linger over it. He takes his fingers away, which now are covered in blood. He leans forward slightly to lightly kiss my forehead.

"I'm ecstatic to see your ok though, you don't know how happy I am to see that your living." I go to open my mouth but I hear the sirens so I close my mouth.

"I have to go and see if anybody saw anything. After that, I promise I'll be at the hospital. Your tough Killer, you'll do ok." He gives me a sad smile before getting up and leaving. Shortly afterwards, Stella and Medic come over.

"Ms. Stevens, We would normally put you on a stretcher but because of the injuries on your back, we are just going to have you sit in the back."

"Ok." Stella and Medic help me up and I wince slightly as I am lifting my back up off the side of the garbage bin. I then am quickly shuffled into the back of the ambulance and driven to the hospital.

She got grabbed again! And as Flack said, he ain't happy :) but 'she's tough Killer she'll be fine' :D


	10. Chapter 10

New York Detective That Complicated My Life

I had arrived at the hospital shortly after they had put me in the back of the ambulance. Right now I'm laying in a hospital, waiting for the doctor's report and doing nothing. I'm just going to come out and say this, that I'm not the type of person who can contentedly lie in one place for periods of time doing nothing. I need to be up and moving! That's why I am not liking being in the hospital.

I'm in the process of sitting up in bed when Danny and Mac walk into room.

"I'm perfectly fine, why can't they just let me go home?"

"Hate to burst your bubble there Annabel, but you're not perfectly fine. In case ya haven't noticed, you're in a hospital." Danny comments as he sits down in a chair across the room.

"Thanks Danny, thanks a lot for keeping it real." He just smiles as he makes himself comfortable. Mac comes over to the hospital bed.

"Annabel, I and I think I can speak for the rest of the team when I say we're going to get the guy that did this. Now, Stella told me you saw his face, can you tell me what you saw."

"Yeah His hair and beard looked like he wad homeless, but the rest of him was just... off for someone who's homeless. Clean shirt, pants and a decent pair of shoes."

"One of them was fake, And I bet you that the hair and beard were fake. It would be way to easy to spot someone with crazy facial hair, the clothes though were probably real. Or who know's, maybe it's the other way around." Danny responds as he looks at Mac. Just as Mac opens his mouth, the doctor walks in with a clipboard.

"Mrs. Stevens you are a very lucky girl. The cuts on your face and arm had just missed major arteries. The blows to your back had not broken and ribs or caused internal bleeding."

"So does that mean I can go home?" I ask, excited to hopefully getting the hell out of here. The doctor laughs and shakes his head.

"Yes you can, but you can't do any overly vigorous activities and your going to need to take these antibiotics when you wake up and when you go to bed. Do you have someone to watch over you?" He looks over at, which causes Mac and Danny do the same thing. I open my mouth to say no when I hear a voice go "Yes she does, and it's me." I look towards the door of the room and Flack is now fully in the room.

The doctor nods his head. "All right then, here are the antibiotics, you can leave whenever your ready." The doctor hurries out of the room. Danny stands up from his chair and pats Flack and the shoulder.

"Last time I believe you when you say she's not your girl." Flack turns to respond but Danny has already walked out of the room. Mac follows behind him.

Flack comes over from the entrance of the room to stand next to the hospital bed. My eyes are still somewhat wide at his entrance and then I realize that he already said he'd be coming. Lucky the doctor's had left my clothes on so we can avoid the awkward changing.

"Told you I'd be coming, so are you ready to leave?" He asks, lightly placing hand on my shoulder. I respond by trying to sit up and get out of bed.

"I take that as a yes, but easy there. Your going to kill yourself." He helps me get out of the bed by coming to stand in front of me. He takes his hands and lightly places them on the area right above my hips. I slightly stiffen up as a reflex.

"Relax." He whispers as he get's a firm grasp on it, then lightly lifts me up out of the bed and places me on my feet, in front of him. He drops his hands from my hip area and sticks them back his sides.

"See, you didn't kill yourself trying to get out of the bed. You should be glad I'm here." He spoke with a hint of laughter.

"Yes I am, cause what would I do if I didn't have you to help me out of bed when I can get up on my own." I say sarcastically as I walk towards the entrance to the room. Flack follows me out of the room.

"Stella already brought a bag of some of stuff you'd need while your staying with me, I hope that's ok." He pulls me off to the side in the doorway of an empty room, away from the hallway.

"Yeah that's fine but... I didn't think you were serious."

"Didn't think I was serious about what? You staying with me?" I nod my head slightly.

"Of course I was, I need to know your going to be safe at all times. I can have that piece of mind if you're at my place. Besides, it will give me an opportunity to be able to see you more." He looks at me as he starts to raise his hand up to my face but stops and puts it back down. He instead pushes some strands of hair off of my face. He walks out of the doorway, pulling me along by the hand.

The next ten minutes were spent getting out of the hospital, in the car, and off to his place.

As were riding in the car, he attempted to make small conversation about his work, the new York rangers but I just continuously stared out the side window. It's not that I didn't want to make conversation with him, I do it's just for some reason I can't make the words come out of my mouth.

I'm still staring out the window when I finally notice the car has pulled to a stop and he has turned the car off.

"We're here." I move my head from the window to raise my eyes so I could look at him. I blinked, but what I saw truly terrified me for the 3 seconds I did see it.

I saw the guy, holding a knife up to my face and digging into my cheek, and this time I screamed instead of whimpering. I shutter as I open my eyes again.

"You ok?" I look at Flack and see that he just saw the entire thing. His blue eyes show concern.

"Yeah I'm fine." I open the door and get out of the car. He comes around to the other side of the car and takes my hand and starts pulling me towards this brick building that has multiple stories. Once we get inside the building, we only have to climb a single set of stairs (thank god for that!) Before he steps in front of a door. He takes out his keys and unlocks his door. I hear the lock click and he opens the door. The inside of his place is simple. The rather small kitchen is towards the right of the entrance. There's a wall to left that has photo's covering most of it. Him with a women who I assume is his sister Sam, one of the biggest ones though is of him with Mac, Stella, Danny, Hawkes, and a girl with longer brown hair.

"Your bag is in the guest room. It's down the hall and to the left. You might want to get some sleep it's almost 11." Nodding my head I follow his directions as I go down the hall and to the left where I see my bag sitting on the bed. I walk into the room and the bed is situated in the middle of the room with a lamp on the bedside table. My favorite part of the room is the window sill that is big enough for me to sit on and it over looks the street. Turning my attention back to my back, I open it to see what's it. Stella put a few outfits in there along with my travel size makeup bag along with a few other things I would need. When I one of the side pockets, there's a frame in there. Taking it out, it's the picture of me and my Cousin Tony with a Sticky note attached to it. It reads 'a little slice of home, stella." Smiling I take a shirt and sweatpants out of the bag and I put that on. I go to lay down in bed, but when I close my eyes again, I see his face again, except he was holding the knife up to my throat.

Getting out of bed, I make my way over to the window and I was right, I do fit on it. I situate myself to where the window is to my left and if I were to look straight ahead I would be staring at the door. I tuck my knees up closer to my face and wrap my arm around my legs. I look out the window and find myself getting lost in the world outside. I'm only dragged out of it when I hear a knock on the door. Taking my head away from the window, I look at the door and see Flack in a shirt and sweat pants as well.

"Why aren't you sleeping?" He asks his arms crossed.

"I can't." I admit, my voice becoming weak.

"How come?" He asks, coming over and leaning against the window sill in front of me.

"Every time I close my eyes, even when I blink. I see his face, the look in his eyes. I see the knife being pressed into my face. Hell, I can even remember the smell. The image is just burned in my eyes."

"Why is it getting to you? I know your stronger than that."

"I'm afraid ok? I'm afraid that he's going to back and the next time, I'm not going to make it out alive and if I do it's not going to be by much." I look at him, and I think Flack finally get's it because he uncrosses his arms. He lightly grabs my arm and pulls me up from the window sill. He walks over to the bed, lays down, and rests his head against the headboard.

"Come here." He motions for me to come over. I walk over to him and he pulls me down next to me.

"What are you doing?" I ask him as I move slightly to give him room but he pulls me closer to him.

"I am going to stay here until you fall asleep, because you need to sleep. I want to help you, so let me do this... for you." He starts stroking my hair lightly. Slowly, my eyes start getting heavier. I move my head onto his arm to use a pillow.

"Thank you." I mumble as I start getting extremely comfortable.

"Your welcome." Flack says. He continues to stroke my hair as his other arm and hand wrap around me, holding me closer to him.

"I'm not going to let anything happen to Annabel." He whispers.

"How long." I was fading fast but I know I heard him say "As long as you want me too."

So in my opinion I thought the ending was incredble, what do you guys think


	11. Chapter 11

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

I wake up the next morning feeling oddly warm, like really warm. I open my eyes to my face pressed into something white... and solid. Then I realize, it has heartbeat. Looking up, I see Flack's head, and then It finally hits me. He fell asleep last night, and now my face is pressed against his chest. Ok, this is slightly awkward. Then again, it's kind of nice to not fall asleep alone for once. Usually, when an ex would 'sleep' with me, they would leave in the middle of the night. So, it's nice to have this feeling. I look at our position and it's just like we had fallen asleep last night.

I try to get up but his arm tightens his hold on me, leaving me with me with no choice but to lay back down. I go to close my eyes again when I hear Flack's voice.

"Good morning."

"Morning."

"Sorry I didn't leave last night, I feel asleep... not that I mind that I did..." He leans down slightly to kiss the top of my head.

"It's fine... I actually slept really good."

"I hate to say this but I told you so..." I turn around slightly and slap his arm. His grip on my arm loosens, so I remove his arm from my waist and get up.

"Where are you going?" He asks. I grab my bag that Stella brought here.

"Shower, enjoy your morning." I walk away as a smirk finds its way on my face.

"Woah... hold up..." I hear him climbing out of bed just as I enter the bathroom, shut the door and lock it. I set the bag on the counter as I dig out my shampoo and soap. Then my makeup bag is set on the counter.

When I get into the shower, my mind automatically goes to what's happened over the past couple of days. Then I look at the cut on my arm, and get a good look at. It's still somewhat red but the cut itself is starting to heal. When I turn my back towards the shower, the hot water beats down on the bruises. It somewhat hurts, but yet it soothes the pain as well. I do what I need to do then get out and dry off. I put my shampoo and soap back in my bag then fully dry out my hair before simply brushing it out. Then I put on a gray t-shirt, dark blue jean shorts, and a teal necklace. I put on a smidge of lip gloss then put everything back in the back. I unlock the bathroom door then walk out, dropping the bag back on the bed, then I walk into the kitchen to find Flack dressed in another suit, and he's holding something in his hand.

"What is that?" I ask him. He doesn't respond as he shoves it into my hand and I look at it.

"It's your antibiotics the doctor's told you to take." I look at the medication then at him.

"Don't even think about it... I will shove that medication down your throat if I have to. Please for me?" He gives me a sad look. Shaking my head, I throw the medication in my mouth, then swallow.

"See wasn't that bad was it? Anyways, I have to get into work. I'll see you later." He kisses me on the cheek before walking towards the door. "I'll call you later today." He then leaves out the door without out another word. And now begins the many hours of being alone. As I go to walk back towards the bedroom, my phone goes off. I rush in and dig for my phone. I answer it.

"Hello?"

"Yes, Mrs. Stevens is Anthony Hodgkin. We have made a decision."

"You have?" I ask.

"Yes we have, and we decided that we would extremely lucky if you would join the Hodgkin team." Holy shit I got the job!

"I would be honored."

"Welcome to the team then. I will email you more details about when you start." He hung up. Yes! I can stay in New York! I have Flack to thank for that though because he had actually gotten me the job in a way because he recommended me for the job.

I have the phone in my hand to call him when someone knocks on the door. I put my phone down on the table and walk over by the door.

"Who is it?" I call out.

"It's your cousin Tony." Tony? What, no way. I look through the peephole which I have great difficulty doing because of my height but sure enough on the other side of the door is my cousin Tony, with his black hair slicked back slightly and his signature leather jacket and white t-shirt. I open the door, extremely excited since I haven't seen my cousin since he helped me move here to New York. I open the door as fast as I could without ripping it off the hinges. Tony looks at me, his green eyes twinkling.

"There's my little short fry." Tony ruffles my hair.

"I'm 5'5."

"Exactly, you could go into a vat of radioactive waste, you could afford to grow a few feet." I punch him in the arm.

"Tony, what are you doing here, and how did you know where I would be?" I ask, moving out of the way slightly so he could step in. I shut the door behind him.

"Well, imagine my surprise when I get a call from a New York detective by the name of Don Flack in the middle of an interview saying that your cousin's been attacked on the streets." His green eyes turning angry. I can't believe Flack called my cousin, why?

"What the hell happened Annabel? And I'm not leaving til you tell me the story, the ENTIRE story." He asks, his accent get thick. I sigh as I sit at the table with my hands folded. I tell him everything, about the first and the second time I has gotten. In fact, I've told him everything since this has all started except any deals with Flack. That means I never told him about the date and how were 'unofficially officially together' in my opinion. By the end of it, Tony has sat across me at the table with his hand lightly on my arm.

"Thank you for telling me, I appreciate it. I have one more question though, why are you here? Instead of at home?" Ok, I don't know how to answer this question. Shit, I'm screwed.

"Well... after I had been grabbed the second time, some Detectives thought it would be a good idea to stay in this 'safe house' sort of. So the guy if he wanted to come after me again, couldn't find me." Tony gives me a questioning look but doesn't act on it.

"Ok, Annabel I'm glad your going to be ok." He stands up as I do too and he pulls me in for a hug.

"I'll be in New York for a few days to do some client searching," I forgot to mention that Tony builds custom bikes for a living. "So if you ever wanna talk or hang out you know my number." He winks at me before walking towards the door.

"I'll be sure to do so." He smiles one last time before opening the door and walking out, closing it behind him. As I get up to lock the door, my phone rings. Picking it up, I see it's Flack. All I do is put it on vibrate and put it back down.

For some reason, I don't know why but I'm mad at Flack. I can't believe he called and told my cousin what happened! This is exactly why I didn't want Tony to know in the first place, because I knew he would come over as soon as he heard what happened. I just can't believe Flack went over my head and called him. How did he even get my cousin's number?

My phone vibrates and I briefly look at it to see that Flack is calling again. I ignore it as I grab the phone and head into the bedroom. I look in my bag and it's like Stella read my mind because a book and my head phones are in my bag. Grabbing the head phones and book, I get comfortable on the bed, plug my head phones into my phone, turn on my phone and play music. Just as I open the book, Flack calls my phone for the third time, but again I ignore it as I open the book and begin to be immersed in the reading.

I don't know how many hours later it is but I'm in the bathroom taking a break from the reading when I hear the front door open the close shortly afterwards. I hear footsteps outside the door in the hallway.

"Annabel?" I hear Flack call out. I open the bathroom door and step out to be greeted by Flack.

"Ohh thank god. I thought he got you again. Why didn't you answer the phone? Did you not know I called MULTIPLE times?" He asks, his blue eyes getting cloudy with anger.

"Ohh I know you called..." I respond as I try to move but he blocks me in at the doorway with his arm.

"Then why didn't you call back?"

"Because I didn't want to call back, much less answer the calls." I look at his eyes And I swear they've changed from the lighter blue they usually are to a dark blue.

"Why did you ignore my calls?! I was worried sick about you."

"Next time, don't go over my head and call my cousin." I duck under his arm that had me trapped against the doorway and start to walk away, but he follows me.

"He actually came?" He sounds surprised.

"What the hell did you think he was going to do when you told him that I was attacked on the streets? Send flowers?"

"I didn't think he would come from Boston. I called just to tell him..."

"That's what I didn't want you to do! I didn't want him to know because I didn't want him to worry! Now he , which is the exact opposite of what I wanted..." I start walking towards the kitchen when Flack grabs my arm.

"Look, I'm sorry I know I shouldn't have gone over your head to call him. I just thought that someone should know what happened..."

"Yeah and you thought wrong." I shake my arm out of his grasp and walk towards the room where I enter, and close the door. Flack goes to the other side of the door and lightly bangs his fist against it.

"Annabel, come on let's talk about this. I'm sorry, just open the door." His banging at the door stops. I just sit in silence on window sill.

"Take that as a no..." I hear him say, the footsteps away from the door, then a door closing. Getting up from the window, I go and open the door a crack then go over to my bag and take out a t-shirt and shorts and change into them before I take the picture of me and my cousin that I had put on the bedside table and hold on to it.

Sighing, I put it back on the table then sit cross-legged on the bed and start rubbing my eyes. While I'm rubbing my eyes, I hear almost silent footsteps coming into the room. I take my hands away from my eyes for a moment to see Flack sitting on the corner of the bed in a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and the dress pants.

"You ok?" He asks.

"Fine." I give a simple answer.

"You know, lying to a detective isn't a smart idea."

"And I don't care..." Then I mutter under my breath as I realise I just told him I was lying in a way. He just shakes his head as he pulls me closer towards him. I stiffen but he continues pulling me towards him to the point where he is sitting up and my head is in lap, which now I'm not comfortable with.

"Today when you so kindly wouldn't answer your phone..." He looks down at me for a second. "I was in a meeting with the chief inspector, who by the way has no idea about what happened. Anyways, I was in the meeting when you didn't answer your phone again, so I decided to leave. Which by the way, he was not happy with. Let me tell you something, if the chief inspector were to catch wind of... this I could get in huge trouble because technically I can not get personally involved with anyone in a case because it could so-called 'mess up my perception of the case' never understood that but..." He takes his fingers on his right hand and starts playing with my hair slightly. "I figured though... let him find out... because your safety is more important to me then my job." I looked up at him.

"You serious?" I ask him.

"Why wouldn't I be?" He leans down lightly to kiss my forehead before continuing speaking.

"I was talking to Danny and I asked him for some advice." I look at him with my eyebrow raised.

"Yeah I know doesn't happen real often, but it happens. I had asked him how to show you that I'm serious about us and this is what he said..." He leaned down far enough to where his lips touch mine. As it goes on, He starts pouring his emotions into it one by one, Sadness, anger. He pulled away to look me dead in the eye. His eyes were practically shining as he smiled slightly.

"I love you Annabel." He whispers.

"You what?" I stutter out.

"You heard me, I love you Annabel." As I'm looking at him, tears starts appearing in my eyes, so I turn my face into the side of his leg.

"Why are you crying? That wasn't suppose to make you cry."

"No other person I've been with has said that to me." I say this as my face is still pressed into his leg. He starts to move, but he drags me with him as he leans against the headboard like the previous night except I'm crying into his chest. I know, romantic right?

"It's ok, stop crying." He runs his hand up and down my back. Once I calm down, he presses a kiss into my hair. I turn so my face is now facing the wall ahead.

"I never told you this but I got the job."

"That's fantastic..."

"I just wanted to thank you because you were the one that recommended me and I thought I would just..." He silences me by putting a finger over my mouth.

"First, you talk wayy too much and second of all..." He kisses me "congratulations." He leans down and puts his lips right next to my ear. "Let me show you how much I love you..." He flips over so he's on top of me.

"What are you..." Not that I'm objecting I'm just curious, but my objection isn't heard all the way through because he cuts me off by crashing his lips against mine, and kissing me. Man, was it hot before he broke it off. It actually had me slightly panting.

"You said in previous relationships, they haven't told you they loved you. I'm proving to you how much I love you." He cuts me off with another searing hot kiss before I can speak.

So he said he love her! And some... other things are going to happen ;) or maybe not? Guess your going to have to wait and find out


	12. Chapter 12

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

His mouth is trailing down my neck as I'm looking up at the ceiling. God what am I doing, I shouldn't be doing this but then at the same time I feel like I should be doing this. His hand slowly slides up inside my shirt to rest right above my right hip. He starts slightly nipping at the base of my neck. His works his way up to earlobe where he lightly tugs on it with his teeth. His hand that was at my right hip makes his way up to my right side of my ribcage. What is he doing?

I am about to ask what he's doing when my phone starts ringing in pocket.

"Don't answer it." He says as his mouth finally moves back to mine but I pull away.

"I have to." With my phone in my back pocket, I have some difficulty taking it out of my back pocket since Flack is on top me and his mouth is back on my neck, but he moves down to my collarbone. I finally take the phone out of my pocket and answer it, all while he's doing what he's doing.

"Yeah?" I ask hoping that I don't sound out of breath.

"Hey Annabel, it's Stella I was wondering if you wanted to head out for a girls night with me." She asks as he starts to fiddle with the end of my t-shirt.

"Yeah, of course." I respond as I bite back a groan.

"Ok, I'll pick you up outside Flack's place in 30."

"All right, see you then." I shut the phone as I put it on the bedside table. He starts to lift the edge of my shirt slightly, but that's when I roll out from underneath to get him to stop.

"What's going on?" He asks as he catches his breath.

"I need to get ready Stella's picking me up in 30 to go out so you need to go so I can get ready." He groans as he get's up from the bed and walks out calling "we're not done with this." He shuts the door behind him. Shaking my head, I reach into my bag to take out an outfit for girl's with what I have. I put on a pink shirt and a pair of jeans that I have a hell of a time getting on. Then my leather jacket and head out of the room, but as I start walking, I realise these jeans are fucking difficult to walk in.

"Oh my god, I hate these jeans." I groan as I start walking towards the kitchen.

"Why did you hate those jeans?" I hear Flack as I round the corner and into the kitchen to grab a glass of water.

"Because I can barely walk in them."

"Why the hell do you wear them then?" I turn around and find him at the entrance of kitchen.

"They make my thighs and my ass look amazing." His eyes travel down my eyes.

"Not going to disagree with you on that one." He comes closer to me, his hands trapping me on either side of the counter. "How about when you get back we... finish what was started?" He asks, a smile creeping its way on his face.

"Possibly..."

"Well then just think about." He kisses the tip of my nose just as a car horn goes off outside.

"That's Stella." I put my jacket and run into the bedroom to put on my inclosed black heels. With them on I actually have a few inches added. I very carefully, but quickly speed walk back into the kitchen.

"I'll see you when you get back." Flack pulls me in for a quick, but thorough kiss. "Have fun." I open the door and I'm about to step out when I instead step back and look back.

"Yeah?" He asks looking at me.

"I love you." I blurt out, then I quickly step into the hallway and close the door behind me. As I walk down the flight of stairs I had walked up yesterday, a lot goes through my mind. First of all, why the hell did I just randomly blurt out I love you, then not stick around. I mean what the hell is that? That to me is basically just saying 'i'm too afraid to admit that I love you.

Shaking the rest out of my head, I finally make my way outside to see Stella waiting outside for me.

"Annabel, you look great." She brings me over to the . car and we both get in. This was the start of a good night.

(Flack's POV)

Let me just say, Annabel has definitely turned out to be the girl I never thought she was going to be. I'm going to admit, when I first talked to her, I thought she was just another small town girl who had big dreams and came to new york. She was the exactly the opposite of what I thought. At first I had always kind of liked her but I didn't want it to seem like 'hey it's the guy who uses women faster than most people can tie their shoes' I didn't want to be that guy anymore, I just Didn't tell anyone because let's face it, they were going to think I was insane. I didn't tell anyone until I had asked Danny for advice, which believe me was something I would usually not do, but I was desperate. As I start to know Annabel more, I realized she's not the girl that's just going to one a casual hook up, she's going to want more.

When I told her I loved her, I was honestly not expecting her to cry into my leg. I thought maybe she'll think I'm joking around or she'll walk out of the room, but not under any circumstances cry into my fucking leg. I was shocked to hear that no other guy she's been with has told her they loved her. I don't know if it's because past relationships were just not that serious or the guys were just ass holes, but that kind of made me shocked because how could someone led her on, and then end up not loving her, I just don't get it.

Ok, let me state this, I have a rule. Even though despite being the 'ladies man' everyone thinks I am I will not sleep with a girl until the third date, I have respect for them, but with Annabel have I told her I loved her, I don't know what was going on with me but I just lost control like I couldn't hold it anymore, and for once I don't think I mind. I want to make her feel like she's loved for once, and if I had to sleep with her to do then so be it. I was serious when I told her not to answer her phone, I didn't want to be interrupted because I could tell I almost had her cracked because let me honest, when she bit back a groan while on the Phone with Stella, I had a smile of pride. I was dead serious when I said I wanted to continue what I had started.

When she was leaving and she blurted out 'i love you' and then left I was shocked. Then I felt happy, like extremely happy. By the time though I was out the door and outside, her and Stella had already left. I somehow feel though, that she's somewhat ashamed of what she said, or at least nervous. I know I was nervous when I told her, then again she probably was just nervous. I know I would be If the guy finally said I love you. I just don't want her to do something just because she feels rushed or she feels like I'm making her do this. Then again, now I probably sound like a hypocrite because I don't want her to rush telling me she loves me yet I'm almost pushing her to sleep with me. I just don't know what to do because this is the first time I have felt in a long time that I wouldn't mind being tied down.

(Annabel's POV)

Tonight was fun, we had a drink and most of the two hours was spent just talking. I told her mostly everything about Flack (except ya know me almost sleeping with him) which believe me was incredibly, without a doubt hot what he was doing, I was just not ready to sleep him at the moment, but now I think I'm ready.

I climb the one flight of stairs that lead to his place. When I get outside and I open the door, it is completely dark except for a lamp by the couch being on. I close the front door and take off my jacket. When I walk over to the lamp to turn it off, I realize Flack has fallen asleep on the couch with his phone in his hand. I wonder why he has his phone in his hand? Well, there goes my plan of sleeping with him tonight.

I shut off the lamp by the couch and drape a nearby blanket over him, then walk over to the bedroom. I enter the bedroom and turn on the light. I take of my pink shirt and slide on a grey fitting tang top and my pajama pants. Man, were those jeans difficult to get off. I take off my shoes then put them back in my bag. I then brush my hair out carefully before I turn off the light then climb into bed. I get comfortable and Flack opens the door and turns the light on.

"Ahh what the hell?" I groan as I pull the pillow over my head.

"Thought I'd stop in." He smiles as he sits on the bed next to me.

"How was girls night with Stella?" Flack removes the pillow from over my head and sets it aside.

"If I answer the question, will you turn off the light?"

"Probably Not." I mutter under my breath as I get out of bed and turn off the light, but he turns on the lamp.

"Seriously?" I get it out of my head that I might actually be able to sleep.

"Seriously. I just talk to you." He goes to ruffle my hair but I slap his hand away.

"Wow, feisty. Didn't know you were that kind of girl." He snickers as I look at him.

"I've been meaning to ask this, but how's the case going where I found the dead body? Any suspects?" The smile on his face falls when I ask that question. I can tell for a second he struggles to find something to say.

"We have... some leads. You know I can't tell you this sort of thing." He says as he pulls me towards him.

"I know but I just thought since it was me... You might make an exception."

"Your adorable you know that?" He kisses the side of my head.

"Come on, let's go to sleep." I look at him like he has three heads. "Don't look at me like, I know you liked sleeping with me last night."

"There goes the ego, anyways night." I lean over to give him a simple kiss when he takes it a step further by getting on top of me. As much as it killed me, when he started to trail his lips lower I pushed him off of me.

"Not tonight. Now go to sleep." I lean over the night stand and turn the light off. Once, I settle back into bed Flack pulls me up against him, resting one of his hands on my stomach. He pressed a kiss into my hair before moving his mouth towards my ear.

"I love you too." He whispers as his presses his face into my neck. All I do is smile as I being to fall in a peaceful sleep.

I wake up the next morning, with no one next to me. Figures, would have happened sooner or later. Sighing, I get up out of bed and make my way into the kitchen. I look at the counter and see a cup of coffee with a piece of paper next to it. I walk over to the piece of paper and pick it up.

_Sorry I had to leave early for work, sad to see I couldn't be here when you woke up. Coffee's on the counter for you. One for more thing, try to have a good day without me_.

I smile as I pick up the still hot cup of coffee. I just touch the cup to my lips when there's a knock on the door. I set the cup down and walk over to the door and open it. I find Stella standing on the other side of the door.

"Hey, what's going on?" I ask.

"Annabel, I really hate to do this but... I'm going to need you to come with me." Woah, what the hell is going on?

"What the hell does this have to do with?"

"It has to do with the body you found."

"Again, why are you here?" Stella sighs before speaking.

"I have orders from Flack to bring you in for question." WHAT!

"I'm sorry, but for what?"

"You're a suspect in the murder of the body you found."

Looks like someone is in a bit of a pickle, and it's caused by Flack?


	13. Chapter 13

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

She's bringing me in for questioning when I did nothing wrong, and in top of all of this, Flack ordered her to do this! My day just keeps getting better and better!

"Look Annabel, I'm already doing you a favor by not having any other people bring you in. Please just grab a jacket and come with me. I really don't want to do this but I have to." I get a good look at Stella and I do see the regret in her eyes and the unwillingness. Muttering under my breath, I grab my jacket from the coat rack and step outside, closing the door behind me. Stella leads me to the car parked outside. Without another word, I climb into the backseat. I'm silent the ride to the department I use to barely hate, now I hate it with a passion. When we get there, I get out of the back seat and wait for Stella to get out. When she get's out, she stands behind me and starts to lead me into the building.

When we get in the main area, it seems like every person in that room feels the need to stare at me. I ignore them as Stella begins to lead me through the room. On the way, we passed by Flack's desk. He stands up from his chair and looks at me.

"Annabel..."

"Just go to hell ok?" I say to him as Stella leads me past him and towards a holding cell. Another one of the officers opens one of the cells, I walk into it, then they close the door behind me. I go to one of the walls and sit against it, with my arms against my legs.

Flack's eyes are on me as he walks over to the cell. He steps up to the bars as he looks at me.

"You ok?" He asks quietly.

"I don't know, let's see. I had barely woken up and I have to go in for questioning and I'm in a fucking holding cell. On top of all of that, my boyfriend is the one that gave the orders to take me in. What do you think?" I glare at him, then I realise in my head that's the first time I called my boyfriend. Such a romantic time to say it too. He takes his eyes away from me and walks away from the cell.

I lean my head against the wall as I close my eyes. I take a deep breath through my nose as I take in my surroundings. I don't know how much time passes before I hear an officer go "get up." I stand up and he opens the holding cell door. He handcuffs me as he starts to lead me down a hallway. He opens a door down the hallway and tells me to walk in. I walk in and he closes the door behind me. I'm in a freaking interrogation room. There's the typical one way glass and table and chairs. I sit in one of the chairs at the table, and wait for whoever the hell is questioning me. The other door in the room opens and in walks Flack with a folder in his hand. He closes the door and sits in the other chair at the table. He sets the folder on the table and sighs.

"So, did you tell them to handcuff me too?" I ask. Flack ignores that comment as he takes a picture out of the folder and slides it over to me.

"Do you recognize this girl?" He asks with a professional tone in his voice.

"Yes, this is the girl who I found buried in the park."

"What I mean Ms. Stevens, is do you know this woman's name?" I raise my eyebrows at him using my last name.

"I have no freaking clue what the hell her name is and you know that."

"Not to call you a liar, Ms. Stevens but we have evidence that proves otherwise."

"Oh my god, you just basically just called me a liar. Are you seriously going to play this game?" I ask, getting angry because let's face it, he knows I have no fucking clue who this women is. He takes something out of the folder and holds it in his hands. It looks like a report of some kind.

"It says right here, that in the victims home they found an entry on her computer that says and I quote 'Annabel Stevens has had it out for me since the beginning' so we did some digging. Turns out you went to college with our victim. So I'm going to ask you again, do you remember the name Samantha Baker?" He asks, standing up from the chair.

"How the hell am I suppose to remember someone who was in the same college as me? You know is this is insane, why in God's name am I being questioned when I have no fucking clue who she is?"

"Annabel, I'm going to have to ask you to tone it down."

"Ohh you actually used my first name? I am shocked. It looks like your job does come first huh?" I look at him and there's pain in his eye's.

"You know that's not true."

"Then why did you bring me in when you know damn well I don't know who she is?" He doesn't answer that as he just looks at me.

"Next time, why don't you just believe me the first time around ok?" I ask, my wrists straining against the cuffs.

"I'm just doing my job Annabel."

"Exactly my point." Flack gives me a sad look as he stands up from the table, opens the door he came in, and walks out slamming the door closed behind him. The same cop comes in the way I came in and stands me up. He leads me back to the holding cell I was in earlier. I go back to the original spot I was in earlier when I was here. When I sit down, I see Danny standing next to Flack at his desk.

"So how pissed is Annabel?" Danny asks Flack as Flack runs a hand through his hair.

"Extremely. The thing is the evidence doesn't lie Danny. She knows the victim and she's flat-out denying it." At this point, Danny and Flack look at me and I look at them.

"Looks like we got someone's attention."

"First time today she does not have the look in her eyes of 'I want to kill you'." At that thought, my eyes begin to water as my mind starts to take this into effect.

I am possibly being accused of murder, and just as I got a job that could keep me in New York. If they catch wind of this, they could take the job away and I would have to move back to Oklahoma. I start silently crying as I put my head in my arms.

"Shit Don, she crying?" Danny asks him.

"Yeah she is." I hear Flack sigh as I hear footsteps approaching the cell.

"Hey there Stevens, everything ok in there?" Danny asks.

"As well as everything can go when your accused of murder."

"Yeah it sucks, I was the main suspect in the murder of an undercover in the subway. It sucked, there's no easy way to put it. Sure, my girlfriend wasn't the one that gave the orders to arrest me but it was pretty bad. You want to know what got me through it?" I raise my head to look at Danny.

"What?"

"Well, it's more like a who. Flack did." I raise my eyebrow as best as I can.

"Yeah I know it's not the same situation but hear me out. Flack was one if the main people who had my back when not a lot of people did. He was there, helping me through it. He's a good guy, trust me."

"Flack is just doing his job, believe me when I say that he really does not want to do it, but as you said he's doing it because of his job. It's not like he actually wanted to arrest you and if he did that, there's something messed up with that." I crack a smile.

"See, you're smiling again. Annabel listen real carefully here. Because your Flack's girl, I and the rest of my team will be making sure your cleared. And because we have no real evidence to arrest you of murder..." Danny motions for the cop to open the cell doors. He does so and I stand up, The cop takes my handcuffs off.

"We're letting you go." Danny steps forward and gives me a hug.

"Everything will be okay." He let's go and walk away, leaving me standing alone in the bullpen. I take a deep breath as I wipe my eyes on the sleeves of my jacket. I start walking towards the entrance when Flack stops me.

I look at him with tears in my eyes still. "Yeah?"

"I'll see you at home ok?" He asks, his hand on my elbow. I just nod my head because I'm really not in the mood to talk a lot. He leans down slightly to give me a light kiss. "I love you." He whispers before walking away back towards his desk. I walk back out the door of the building and hail a cab.

When the cab drops me off in front of his place, I pay him with the money I keep in my jacket for emergencies. I then walk up stairs to his place and enter. I close the door as I hang up my jacket. As I walk into the kitchen, my phone which I apparently left on the counter is going off. I walk over to my phone and answer.

"Hello?" I ask, hoping my voice doesn't still sound like I'm crying.

"Do you not look at caller ID anymore?" I hear Flack ask with a smile.

"Apparently I don't." I respond as I try to walk and wipe my eyes at the same time.

"Listen, I wanted to let you know I have to stay late at work tonight, so I don't want you staying up waiting for me ok?" He asks.

"Yeah, ok." I say as I walk towards the bedroom.

"Hey.. I know your still upset about today.." He starts but I interrupt him.

"I don't want to talk about it, I'll see you tomorrow." I say gruffly then hang up. He's not totally forgiven, but he's partly forgiven. To take my mind off of everything, I cleaned and I mean I CLEANED. Literally, probably every visible spot in his place is either free of dust or scrubbed the hell down with pledge.

It was about 4:00pm when I went to get started on the kitchen floor when there's a knock at the door. While I was cleaning, I worked up a lot of sweat so the grey tang top is sticking to my body but I changed into jean shorts and my hair's in a high ponytail. I walk over to the door and look through the peephole and see it's Flack. Why the hell is knocking on his own door, and when the hell did he change into a black t-shirt and jeans?

I open the door and look at him.

"What the hell did you knock on your own door for?" I ask as I wipe some of the sweat off my face.

"Consider it as sort of a peace-offering. Why are you sweating, a lot?" He asks as his eyes travel down my body which is pretty much all covered in sweat.

"I did some cleaning, scratch that a lot of cleaning. Wait, why are you here? Thought you said you were staying late at work?"

"That's not important. The things, I know things are kind of shaky after what happened."

"Kind of shaky? You brought me in for question with murder!" I exclaim as I lean against the door frame.

"Exactly what I mean! Anyways, I didn't want to have to do that. Evidence pointed towards you in a connection towards a victim. I had to bring you in otherwise I could have lost my job. I was right when I said you matter more than my job but in this situation, I had to choose my job. Yes, I know I could've have risked your job, and I apologise for that." He looks at me for any signs of telling him to stop but he doesn't see any so he continues.

"I know it probably would have been easier if I brought you in myself, but I couldn't bring myself to do so. Listen, you deserve better than to be arrested by me." I cock my head to the side slightly because I have no clue what he is saying.

"Look, I know things between us are about as clear as mud but I was wondering, if I promise not to arrest you again, will you be with me... as in be my girlfriend?" He asks, his eyes shining with hope. Damn his eyes, now would be the perfect time to slide sunglasses over my eyes but I don't have them with me! I don't know, he kind of did dig himself out of a hole I didn't think he could.

"I don't know... I kind of don't want to be in a holding cell either." He smiles.

"I can promise you that you won't be in one of those anytime soon."

"It was kind of nice to not wake up alone for once."

"See! I knew you liked sleeping with me at night!" A smirk breaks out on his face.

"Again with the ego, anyways... I would love too." The smirk is replaced with a huge grin. "That's great." He goes in for a kiss then backs away because of all the sweat. "Can I step into my place now?"

"Ohh yeah." I step away from the entrance and let him then close the door behind him.

"How much did you clean exactly?" He asks as he looks around.

"You don't want to know." I respond as I take my tang top and lift it up to wipe my face off. I then set it back in its original position.

"Well in that case..." He takes his arms and pulls me to him, wrapping his arms around my waist slowly. "Thank you." He leans down and gives me a kiss, which as usual started slow but he ended making it move along the track faster backing me up against the counter and resting his hands at my hips.

I pull away and he looks at me, I of course am probably flushed.

"Not now, I'm sweating like crazy and I just finished cleaning. I'm pretty sure you don't want to smell like cleaner and dust."

"As long as it came from you I don't mind.." I laugh as I manage to get out of his arms and walk away towards the shower.

"Come on, I know you want this!" He exclaims, but I didn't answer that question because in fact, I do want to, I want that, I want him.

So they are offically together! And she admitted she wants him, like badly ;)


	14. Chapter 14

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

I get into the shower, allowing the water clean off the sweat and anything left from sitting in that holding cell because let's be honest, a holding cell in a new york city police department isn't exactly the cleanest place around. After getting out of the shower, I just put on the grey tang top and shorts til I get into the bedroom to get new clothes. I walk into the bedroom than grab my bag and grab the only clean set of clothes I have which are a button down green with the sleeves at my elbows and black skinny jeans. I then stick on my black inclosed high heels. I put all my clothes in the bag then walk out of the bedroom.

I get into the kitchen and set it on the counter.

"Flack?" I call. He comes out of one room towards the right of the hallway and his eyes widen slightly.

"What are you doing? Please tell me your not leaving." He asks as he steps up to in front of me.

"I'm not leaving, I just need to go back to my place real quick and grab some things, that's all." His eyes return to their normal size.

"I'll go with you, I can drive you." He grabs his keys but I reach into his hand, grab his keys, then set them on the table.

"I can handle this on my own. I'll just take a cab or a bus."

"Are you sure? Cause I can..."

"Flack, I'll be fine." He looks at me before sighing.

"There's no way in winning is there?"

"Nope."

"Just be careful ok?" He asks as he leans down to kiss my cheek.

"Think I can't handle myself?" I grab my bag off the counter and head towards the door.

"I don't know, you are from Oklahoma."

"Thanks for insulting Oklahoma. Next time, it will be me insulting the Yankees." He all but drops his jaw. "Exactly. I love you Don." I call as I open the door and step out.

"Love you too." I look at him and he's smiling as I close the door and start walking down the flight of stairs. When I get outside, I cab just pulls up to the curb, so I climb in and give him my address. When he pulls up to my place, I climb out and pay him. Then I climb the steps to my place and when I unlock my door, its just as I left everything. I hurry into my bedroom and put the old clothes in my hamper, then grab some new ones and put them in a the bag, along with some other items.

My phone rings just as I close my bag up, so I take it out of my pocket and answer it.

"I'm not dead you know." I answer, assuming it's Flack.

"I know your not dead cause you're talking." Tony responds, his voice sounding closed.

"Woah, Tony what's up? What's going on?" I ask sitting down on the bed.

"Annabel, it's Taylor. She's umm in the hospital." Taylor is his sister, therefore being my cousin Taylor.

"Wait, why is she in the hospital?"

"Annabel, they think somethings seriously wrong with her. Apparently she's had a 102.4 fever for days now. She just went to the hospital with pains in her stomach." The thing is my cousin Taylor is like, no is my sister. I practically grew up with her, we were inseparable even when we were in high school.

"In Oklahoma right?"

"Yeah, she's there."

"I'm on my way there now." As I launch of my bed with my bag and my wallet in hand.

"Ok, just hurry up." He hangs up, and that's when the tears start forming in my eyes. I walk out the door and lock it, then call Flack. I sit outside my place with the phone to my ear, but he doesn't answer. So I rush outside and get into the same cab that brought me here, telling him to take me to the airport. I try to call Flack again but this time it goes straight to voice mail. This time, I call Stella and she answers.

"Stella Bonasera." She answers.

"Stella, it's Annabel. Flack won't answer his phone and I need to tell him I have to go to Oklahoma."

"Rewind, tell me what happened." So I tell her the entire thing from beginning to end.

"I'm on my way to the airport but he won't answer the phone so I can tell I'm leaving." I take a deep breath.

"Ok, calm down. I'll see if he's in the field real quick. Putting you on hold." She puts me on hold and I sit there in silence for about 2 minutes before she comes back.

"Yeah, he's out with Danny checking out a lead. I'll give him a call and tell him, you just go to Oklahoma and worry about your Cousin ok?" She comforts me.

"Ok, thanks." I hang up on her, then lean my head the black head rest of the seats of the cab, trying to calm myself down. Hopefully, she can get a hold of him.

(Flack's POV)

I wasn't expecting to be called into work, but we had a lead on a case, and in the rush I left my phone at home. Danny and I checked the lead out, which turned out to be nothing and are on our way back to the Department.

"So Flack, how's everything with Stevens now that she's not in a holding cell?" Danny asks at a red light.

"Things are... surprisingly calm."

"That's it? Nothing else? I'm surprised ya haven't slept with her yet." I laugh at that as the light turns from red to green.

"I've tried... 3 times."

"And nothing?" He asks.

"Nothing."

"Holy shit, are you loosing your touch Flack?"

"She's different Danny, and I want to actually keep this one. I love her man." Danny gives me a side glance.

"Flack? Are you feeling all right?"

"Very funny Danny." At that moment, his phone rings. So he puts it on speaker.

"Hey Stell, what's up?" Danny asks nonchalantly as he turns stops at yet another red light.

"Hey Danny, Flack still in the car with you?" Stella get's right to the point.

"Yeah, I'm here Stella. What's going on?"

"Annabel went to Oklahoma." Woah, she told me she wasn't leaving.

"Wait, she left? Why didn't she tell me?" I ask Stella.

"She did, tried to call you several times, but you didn't answer."

"That's because I left my phone at home. Now why the hell is she going back to Oklahoma, last moment?" I ask, getting worried very quickly.

"Her cousin Taylor's in the hospital. Looks pretty serious, she told me to tell you to not worry about her and she'll be back in a couple of days." I look over at Danny as Stella finishes.

"Ok, Stell. Thanks for telling me." I hang up rather quickly then look at Danny.

"Take it I'm taking you to the airport?" Danny asks as he begins to change directions from the Department to the airport.

"You know me so well Messer."

"No, I know how you are when it Comes to Annabel." I laugh slightly. I just need to get to Oklahoma and be there with her.

(Annabel's POV)

I've paced in the waiting room of the hospital in Oklahoma in which my cousin Taylor is being held in for an hour now. I'm pretty sure I've made skid marks in the tile flooring. Tony is sitting in one of the chairs next to me. Their parents would be there but they died shortly after Taylor had started living on her own. They've been on their own ever since.

"Annabel, I think if you keep pacing, your going to burn a hole into the floor." Tony comments and I over at him. I probably look like a nightmare with my red eyes and my messed up hair from running my hands through it, over and over again.

"It's been three hours, how long could one fucking examination take? Seriously?" Just as I say that, a doctor comes by with a clip board.

"Taylor Amirez?" They ask and we both stand up.

"Lucky, we were able to get her fever down quite bad, everything's well, turns out she had an insane virus in her stomach. Her room is 205 down the hall if you want." The doctor walks away before we can ask any other questions.

"Why don't you go and see her first Annabel? Looks like you need it more." I don't waste time walking to her room and shortly enough I spot Taylor lying in the hospital. I walk into her room and get a good look at her. Her looks are opposite when it comes to Tony's with her Red hair and hazel eyes which shocks me seeing that none of their parents had red hair.

I walk over to the side of the hospital, and Taylor opens her eyes lazily.

"Hey An.." Taylor mumbles.

"Hey there red, how you feeling?" She straightens up in bed slightly.

"Kind of like shit."

"Well your going to get better in no time." I grab a hold of her hand. I hear footsteps approaching the room and I turn around to see Tony standing there.

"Hey there Annabel, someone's in the waiting room for you." I mouth the word 'what' in disbelief as I let go of Taylor's hand and I walk out of the hospital room and walk back towards the waiting room, where my jaw drops because standing a few feet in front of me is Flack.

"Flack what are you doing here?" I ask, my jaw getting back into its normal place.

"I came when I heard you left, thought you could use the support."

"I'm fine, you didn't need to come here." I say while simultaneously rubbing my eyes. He just shakes his head as he steps closer to me. He takes my arm and pulls me towards him. He takes his right and raises it to my hair to smooth some of it out.

"Annabel, you gotta stop lying to Detectives." He smiles as he leans down and kisses me, before pulling away and pulling my head to his shoulder.

"How is she doing?" He asks he runs a hand over my back.

"She's going to be ok."

"Then why are you crying?" He asks he takes his thumb and wipes away a tear that was sliding its way down my cheek.

"I don't know." I walk away from him to sit down in one of the chairs. "I have absolutely no clue why." He comes to sit down in the chair next to me.

"Let me give you a piece of advice Annabel. You can't be strong for everyone, believe me I've tried that. It just doesn't work." He rests his hand on my shoulder.

"Flack, can you just take me back to my hotel. I just need some time."

"Of course." He stands up from his chair and grabs my hand, pulling me against him so I am tucked into his arm and my face is practically pressed into his upper torso. We take the long walk back to the parking lot. When we get to the passenger side door.

"You know your going to have to let go to get into the car right?" He mumbles into my hair. I step away from him and climb into the car. He silently climbs into the driver's side then turns to me.

"Where is it?" He asks.

"Down the street to the right. First one on the left side of the street." He turns his head to face forward towards the road. He starts the car and drives the short way to the hotel. When he get's there, he stretches across me and opens the door, pushing it open further. I step outside and walk towards the entrance of Hotel, and stop in front of it. Flack walks over to me and stops across from me.

"Everything ok Annabel?" He asks.

"Yeah.. I'm fine... I'll probably just finish up packing upstairs and then head on a plane back to New York."

"Do you mind if I take a quick shower in the bathroom upstairs?" He asks, pointing up with his finger.

"Yeah.. sure." I walk into the hotel with him following me and I lead him to my first floor room, which is to the left of the entrance. When we walk into the hotel room, he heads straight towards the bathroom. He closes the door behind him as I go and sit down in a chair my the window and put my elbows on my knees. I hear him turn on the shower as for some reason, I start sobbing. Not to loud though, I assume though loud enough for Flack to hear because he turns the shower off. I hear the door to the bathroom open and then close again. I'm still sitting on the chair with my elbow's on my knees crying when Flack comes in front of me wearing a white muscle shirt and the black pants he was wearing.

"Annabel?" He asks crouching down in front of me. He takes his index finger and tries to tilt my face up to look at him but I forcefully don't allow it.

"What's wrong? This about your cousin?" He tries to get me to look at him again but I keep my eyes glued to the floor. He stands up in front of me, pulling me up along him which took more force then usual.

"Flack what are you..." I am stopped by him smashing his mouth against mine. He starts to pull away when I slide my hands up his arms and I locked my hands together at his neck, pulling him back down. He slides his hands around my waist to hold me still. He pulls away, slightly panting and he looks at me, his bright blue eyes shinning.

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

"Yes." He doesn't waste time asking more questions as he crashes his lips back onto mine as he starts backing me up towards the bed. When we edge the bed, he pushes me down onto it slightly as he at the same time pushes me further onto it.

He balances himself on top of me as his lips finally leave my mouth as they make a trail down the side of my neck, to my collarbone and back up to my mouth. He tucks his thumb into my belt loop, pulling my hips closer to mine. My hands unlock from their position at the back of his neck to move towards his shoulder blades. Just as his hands move to the buttons of my shirt, a shirl ringing starts going off. He reluctantly pulls away and grabs his phone that's ringing on the bedside table he apparently put on there.

"Detective Flack." He answers professionally. "Yeah, ok got it. I'll be there." He shuts the phone and puts it back on the table, then get up from on top of me.

"I'm so sorry but I have to go back to New York right now. There's a major break in a case and they need me. You don't how badly I want to continue this, but I have to leave." He walk into the bathroom and comes out minutes later with everything else on.

"I'll make this up to you, I promise." He comes over to me and gives me a light kiss before walking towards the door. "Call me when you get back to New york. I love you." He smiles at me once more before opening the door and walking out.

Ok, First what the fuck? Seriously, he has to leave just as he was about to take my shirt, are like the god's plotting to do whatever it takes to not have us sleep together. Groaning I get out of bed, and finish packing what I originally suppose to be doing. Once I finish packing and making sure I have everything, I walk out of the room, and check out of the hotel room. Once that's done, I make my way back to the airport to get back to New York, like Flack is doing.

When the plane lands in New York, I am surprisingly wide awake. With my bag in hand, I walk out of the terminal and see Danny standing there. I walk over to him, where he takes the bag out of my hand.

"Danny! What are you doing here?" I ask him.

"Flack asked me to pick you up from the airport and take you somewhere." He starts leading me towards to where I assume he has parked.

"Where is somewhere exactly?"

"That my friend I can't tell you, I'm not allowed to tell you why either. I'm just suppose to pick ya up, and drop you off." We finally get outside the airport.

"That's sounds kind of suspicious."

"You say suspicious, I say mysterious." I laugh as we finally reach the car, and i get in as he tosses my bag in the back seat.

"Suspicious, mysterious whatever. It still sounds creepy as hell. I mean for all I know, your just luring me there so someone can kidnap me."

"Trust me, that won't happen any time soon." He starts the car and starts driving off to where he's suppose to drop me off at.

"So there was no break in a case was there?" He gives me a sideways glance.

"That's what he told you? Quick question, what were you guys doing that left him so... distracted?" I turn away so he can't see my face get incredibly.

"Ohh so that's what you were doing, tell me did you finish?" Oh my god, did he seriously just ask that question?

"Didn't even get started."

"Owch, I'd be distracted too." I glare at Danny before my face returns to normal. Soon enough, Danny pulls up in front of a random bar.

"Ok, so go in there. He should be there in 10 minutes. I'll take your bag back to your place, which Flack already gave me the address. Go in, head straight and sit down at the bar." I get out of the car but don't close the door.

"Wow, demanding much?"

"Hey don't shoot the messenger here, I'm just follow instructions. Have fun." I close the door, and head towards the entrance. When I step in, I do what I was told and go straight to the bar, where I ask for a simple rum and coke. I check my phone and it says 7:45. I put my phone back as I turn my attention to one of the many tv's hanging above the bar, which is some sort of hockey game. I end up getting lost in it, with no interruptions. Where the hell is he? I check my phone and it now says 8:15. And soon I find the time passing more and more. 8:20, 8:30, then 8:45 rolls around and it has me wondering, is he ever coming?

So, everyone's probably wondering where the hell is Flack? Well, you'll find that out next chapter :)


	15. Chapter 15

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

Once 9:20 rolls around, I realize I've most likely been stood up. Putting money down on the bar, I get up and walk out towards the entrance. When I get outside, the chill of the wind hits me across the face. Just as I manage to hail a cab, a car comes screeching into the parking lot. The car comes to a halt and Flack jumps out of the drivers sear, and walks over to me.

"Annabel, I am so sorry I got held up at work and I couldn't get out." He starts explaining frantically.

"It's fine, don't worry about it." I say just to get him to stop talking.

"No it's not fine. I kept you waiting for over an hour." I look at him and he has a guilty look in his eyes.

"Can you just take me back to my place? I just want to go to sleep."

"Yeah." He tries to take a hold of my arm but I just walk towards the car and get in, still angry about this. I mean he could have fucking called or something. Hell, he could have sent a smoke signal for all I care, just something would be better than nothing. He gets into the car shortly afterwards. Silence is thick the entire ride to my place. When we arrive outside my place, I get out of the car and he comes over towards me. I go to move but he blocks me against the car.

"Annabel, I'm sorry I couldn't be there tonight. Especially after I had to leave earlier today, it was like being blown off twice in less than 24 hours." He laughs slightly as he adjusts his stance.

"Look, I wanted to give this to you when I was actually with you tonight, but since that didn't happen..." He has me stick my hand out and he reaches in his pocket. He pulls out a key and sticks it in my hand.

"A key? For what?" I ask as I enclose my hand around the key.

"It's for my place, I want you to have if you need to talk to me, emergencies, anything at all, you have that. It would make me feel safe that you have that."

"Don I can't..."

"Just take it. I want you to have it." Sticking the key in my pocket, I look at him.

"Thank you."

"Absolutely no problem." I smile at him as I sort of lean into him.

"Why do you have to be soo adorable?"

"I wouldn't use the word adorable. Amazingly sexy, yes, adorable no, just no." He looks down at me as he puts his right on top of the top of the car door frame. He leans forward to kiss me but I duck around him.

"Wow, this is what it feels like to be rejected." I start walking backwards towards the entrance and my lower back hits the outer door handle.

"I think you'll get over it." Flack looks at me before running across the street. Damn, he can run. He stops in front of me.

"Annabel I was thinking, maybe I could stay the night?"

"Well, I'm not guaranteeing anything will happen." He gets a gleam in his eye.

"Wow Annabel, what is wrong with you? I wasn't even thinking that." I can feel my cheeks get incredibly hot.

"You definitely were though." He whispers as He leans down to kiss my cheek before opening the door for me.

"Can't say I blame you though, I mean the way this body is..." He motions towards himself as I walk inside my building just as my phone goes off.

"Who's calling at," Flack checks his watch. "9:50?"

"I don't know." I shake my head and answer the phone.

"Hello?" I ask, walking away slightly but he's watching me like a hawk.

"Yes, Anthony Hodgkin here. I know it's late but I need you to take some pictures of the inside of a house a few blocks from where you said you lived."

"Why does it need to be done now?"

"Because it's urgent these pictures get out as soon as they can so the house can go up on the internet."

"Isn't that extremely dangerous to do? At this time?" When I say, Flack picks his head up and practically gives me the death stare.

"I'll give double the normal rate. Just please, I need this done." I close my eyes and sigh, pinching the bridge of my nose.

"All right, I'll do it. What's the address." He relays to me then hangs up. Running a hand through my hair, I walk over towards Flack.

"What was all that about? Everything ok?"

"Don't know if you'd call it ok but I have to go take pictures of a house a couple blocks away, said it's an emergency." He gives me a weird look.

"This late at Night? Annabel, I don't like the sound of this, I REALLY don't like the sound of this."

"That's why I was going to ask you to come with me." He shakes his head as he lays a hand on my shoulder.

"Like I'd let you do this by yourself. I'll be waiting in the car for you." He takes his hand off my shoulder then walks off back towards the car. I then rush upstairs and grab my camera, sticking in my pocket then going back downstairs and to the car. I get into the car and give Flack the address. He drives off and it doesn't even take five minutes to get there.

He pulls up outside a quaint home that looks in decent shape with nothing not of the ordinary or overly dramatic.

"I'll stay right in the car, making sure nothing comes in while you're in there. Just think of me as your 'unseen bodyguard.' " He looks at me before leaning over lightly to press his lips against my forehead.

"Go do your thing." He smiles before I climb out of the car. Once I get out of the car, I head to the front door and try the door knob. Weirdly, when I turn the knob and push the door, it swings right open. Ok, that's not creepy at all. Walking into the house, I close the door and try the lights. They don't turn on. This house is getting fucking weirder by the minute.

Strangely enough, there's a lantern burning in the middle of the living room floor or what I assume to be the living room floor cause I can't see a damn thing. As I take out my camera, I have giant force, pushing me into the wall. I hit the wall and somehow fall onto something solid like a table. Wait, why is there a table in a house waiting to be sold to someone?

As I'm lying on the floor because of hitting the table, The door opens and a flashlight comes on.

"Annabel?" I hear Flack ask.

"Down here." I say. He flashes the light on me and he rushes over.

"Everything ok?" He helps me up and get's me out of the house. I walk to the car with the help of the lights on the street and get in. Flack also get's in and turns on the overhead light in the car.

"What the hell happened to you in there? Annabel, Your face is bleeding." He reaches across me and goes into the glove compartment and grabs a small rag, then closes it. He starts holding the rag up to my forehead, where apparently I'm bleeding.

"I don't know, I was about to take out my camera when I got pushed up against the wall, and I fell onto a table, which is extremely weird to have a table in a house your selling and not have the lights work." He lightly presses the rag against my forehead. He then takes it off, and checks my forehead.

"You should be good now. As for that house, after what just happened there's no way in hell I'm letting you back in that house." I give him a half-smile before kissing his cheek and sitting back in my seat.

"What was that for?" He asks as he starts the car.

"For caring when I didn't ask you to."

"You don't even have to look at me for me to care about you." He heads towards my house, which again we get there rather quickly. He stops outside and turns towards me.

"Go on up there, I can't join you tonight even though I so desperately want to, I just can't. I hope you understand." He kisses me before I get out of the car.

"Yeah of course, take it your going home then?" I ask him.

"No, I'm going to pay somebody a visit. Make sure you put some ice on it to keep the swelling down. I love you Annabel." He calls out before driving off down the road. Ok, what was all that?

(Flack's POV)

I take a rather long drive to Anthony Hodgin's building as I gather my thoughts. There's a reason he sent Annabel over to that house and Damn it I'm going to find it out. When I get to his office building, I leave my gun in the car which I also carry with me, but since I've known Anthony since College I don't think I'll need it.

I walk into the building, where I'm greeted by a red-head receptionist.

"Hodgkin real estate, how may I help you?" She asks.

"Yes I'm looking for..."

"Don Flack, I'll be damned. Haven't seen you since last year." I turn my head towards the right where I heard the voice come from and I see Anthony coming from down the hall. Anthony is the typical business man. Brown hair swept away from his face, and a clean-cut suit. "He's with me Cindy." Anthony motions me to follow him, in which I do. I follow him to a office surrounded by glass walls. We both step inside.

"So I gotta ask Flack, what brings you by?" Anthony asks as he sits in his desk chair.

"I was in the neighborhood when I got a call from Annabel, she had just finished taking pictures in the house. Seemed pretty shaken up." I see the smallest of smiles crack on his face, but he hides it pretty quickly.

"And you think I'd know something about this?" He straightens up in his chair.

"I'm not saying that, besides even if you do I'm not going to tell the girl. You come before any girl man, especially her." I have such a hard time getting that out because I know it's about as true as me moon lighting as a bouncer.

"All right Don, tone it down." He pauses before speaking. "Yeah, that was set up by me."

"How though? You wouldn't leave a table in a house your selling without trying to sell the table first."

"I own the house, but it's not going up for sale. It's being torn down in a few weeks. I had someone be there and push her into a wall, put some fear into her. Call it a 'hazing' ritual." Wow can I kill this guy.

"I have to say, nice job man." I stand up and walk over to the side of the desk. I stick my hand out for him to shake. He stands up to shake it but I stick that hand back at my side as I take my other hand, ball it into a fist, and take a swing at his jaw. I look and I just clipped it. Anthony holds a hand up to his jaw.

"What the fuck was that for man?" He growls.

"What? I never said I wouldn't do anything. Anyways, what the hell do you think this is college? I'll have you know, Annabel the 'hazing participant' is my girlfriend."

"So you got her the job so you could sleep with her didn't ya?" Anthony asks with a sinister glare in his eyes. I clip him in the jaw again.

"You don't learn do you? Anyways because of your stupid joke or whatever the hell you wanna call it, she's bleeding and scared out of her mind. She's had enough happen to her, she didn't need this. Anything happens to her again and the air even so much as smells like you, I'll be arresting you." With that, I exit Anthony's office and head back out the entrance. I open the car door and sit down, not starting the car yet. I hesitate picking up my phone to call Annabel, telling her that I will be stopping by, but I shut it. Leave it as a surprise.

I start the car and begin making my way back to Annabel's place, feeling oddly proud of what just happened.

(Annabel's POV)

I've been trying to keep my eyes open so I could see if Flack ever comes back, but it's like some ones tied 5 pound weights to them. I've been laying on the couch almost since he left.

Just as my eyes close for what seems like the 10th time, the door opens and closes.

"Annabel, it's Don." He says into my place. Knowing that it's flack, I finally let my eyes close for longer then 10 seconds. I can hear him walking around my place, then he comes and steps in front of the couch. He lightly touches my arm.

"Annabel." He whispers. I open my eyes slightly and Flack's crouching at the edge of the couch.

"Hey.." I mutter as my eyes adjust to the light.

"Have you been waiting up for me?" He asks amused.

"Possibly..." I mumble as I rest my head back down on the pillow of the couch. He leans forward and presses a kiss into my hair.

"Come on, let's get you to bed." He tucks his one arm under my legs and another behind my back as he lifts me up off the couch and stands up at the same time.

"God, how much do you weigh?" He jokes around with me as he carries me to the bedroom.

"You're an ass." I mumble again as I let my eyes close again.

"There's the girl I fell in love with." He responds as we make it to the bedroom. He walks over to my side of the bed, where he lays me down and I almost instantaneously climb under the covers. I hear Flack walk around the bed, so I turn and look at him through my 3/4 of the way closed eyes to see him taking off his shoes and his shirt. I turn back around and bury my face into the pillow. I can feel him getting into bed next to me. He then tucks his arm around my waist and pulls me up against him so my back is flush against his bare chest.

"I love you Annabel." He whispers, knowing that I'm falling asleep rather fast. He then rest his chin on top of my head while his grip on my waist get's tighter.

(Flack's POV)

I've been watching Annabel sleep for the past ten minutes and I have to say, it's rather calming. I am about to get up when my phone vibrates on the side table. I grab it and answer it before it wakes up Annabel.

"Flack." I answer.

"Don, its Danny. I have to tell you something." I sit on the edge of the bed and run a hand over my face.

"Better be important."

"Look, I have a lead on a guy who is Annabel's attacker." I stand up from the edge of the bed and walk into the other room.

"I'm listening."

"Ok, so the blood that Stella had collected from Annabel's lip at the hospital wasn't hers. Came back to the name of Kenny Roberts."

"Got an address?"

"If I didn't would I be calling you." Sighing, I look back at Annabel who's stilled curled up, sleeping yeah.

"All right, I'll meet you out front the department." I snap my phone closed, then go back into the bedroom and put my shirt and my shoes. As I finish putting my shirt on, I look at Annabel. I hate leaving her to where she wakes up alone that morning. Leaning over her, I lightly kiss her forehead before walking out of the bedroom and on my way to the department.

(Annabel's POV)

I wake up, and again he's not next to me. I sit up slightly in the bed so I can see the rest of the apartment and I see no sign of him anywhere. Groaning, I lay back down on the bed. Where the hell could he be?

(Flack's POV)

I'm in the car with Danny, riding to where Kenny Lives when Danny finally speaks up.

"Annabel told me what went down in Oklahoma." He casually says.

"And?"

"And I'm just saying, you probably should have left after you had done what you were doing." I look over at him.

"Your telling me about my love life because..." I ask him as I can see a smile on his face.

"Annabel was practically steaming when she told me last night. Let me guess, left her this morning too?" I stay silent after that.

"Piece of advice, you keep leaving her like that she's going to leave. Learned that the hard way." As I open my mouth, Danny pulls up to the address we have for Kenny Roberts, which is a brick house in a regular neighborhood. We both get out of the car as Danny mumbles "try not to kill him Flack ok?"

"Can't make any promises." I respond just as a man comes out of the fence on the side of the house. This man has the same crazy brown hair, but no beard.

"Can I help you?" The man asks as he wipes his hand on his pants.

"You Kenny Roberts?" Danny asks.

"Depends, who's asking."

"New york city police." I move my jacket slightly to show my badge clipped onto my belt. Once the guy get's a good at the badge, he makes a bolt back from where he came.

"Why do they always run?" I ask before taking off after the guy. When I come to the fence, I easily vault over it and land right behind the guy. I tackle him to the grass, just before we reach the backyard.

"Nervous man? Danny, I'm going to take a wild guess and say this is in fact Kenny Roberts." I hold him to the ground as I cuff him .

"What makes you think that's me?" I get up the bring him up off the ground as well.

"Well it has nothing to do with the fact you ran after you the badge that's for sure." I comment as I begin to lead him back to the car.

-Police Department-

I'm sitting in interrogation with Kenny and he's being incredibly calm.

"So Kenny tell me, were you ashamed when she bit down on your lip?" I ask as I look directly at him.

"I have no clue what you're talking about." I take a picture that Stella took of Annabel's face out of a folder and place it in front of him.

"Well, let me give your memory a jog. You pulled on this women not once, but twice. The first time, nothing. The second time, was more successful. You enjoyed the pain you saw in her eyes as you started to dig the knife into her face." I stand up from the table and walk over to him.

"Again, I have no idea who this women is or what happened to her." He denys again.

"You put this girl in the hospital! Let me tell you something..." I walk back around to the other side of the table. "We have a DNA sample from you. The girl you did this to I care very much about, and if it matches the DNA we found on her, you'll be answering to me." I walk away from the table and out the door. When I walk out, I'm greeted by Mac.

"So, what's next for this scumbag?" I ask Mac as I slowly let a breath.

"Next, we bring in Annabel and see if she can ID the guy." That right there, scares the shit out of me.

(Annabel's POV)

I'm just about to take a walk to a nearby store when I get a text from Stella. I read it and it says 'got a suspect in for your attacker. Need you to come in and ID him.' Gulping, I reply I'm on my way there then walk outside and catch a cab. Then entire ride to the department, I am shaking from the anticipation. When we get there and I step out of the cab, I'm now sweating slightly instead of shaking. I walk into the building while taking a deep breath. When I hit the bull pen, I see Stella coming towards me, while Flack and another officer stand by the guy I assume is the suspect. When I look at the man and he see's me, he gets a catlike grin on his face. Stella now stands behind me, as Flack grabs a hold of the suspect and brings him in front of me.

"That's the guy." I choke out as I look at him.

"You sure that's him?" Stella asks to make sure.

"I'm positive that's him." Before Flack can take him away the suspect spits in my face.

"Deserved that bitch."

"Let's go." Flack practically yells as he drags the man back to where he ever was before I came here.

"Annabel, you ok?" Stella asks as she grabs me a tissue off out of her pocket and hands it to me. I take it and wipe my face with it.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm just going to head home."

"Aren't you going to wait for Flack?" She asks as I start to walk away.

"I'll be fine." I then practically run out of the department, and I take a deep breath. It is so digrating to be spit on, in the face. Ok, it also brings memories back of an ex who constantly spit at me and said I deserved it, finally had the courage to leave him and that was shortly before I came to New York. Taking another breath, I go to walk back inside when Flack walks out.

"Hey you ok? Stella told me you ran out of here quickly." He asks as he brings his hands up to my face and just holds on to it.

"Yeah, it's not the first time that's happen..." I look at him and he drops his hands. Shit, wasn't suppose to say that.

"What?" He clenches his jaw and crosses his arms.

"It was before I met you, an ex used to spit in my face and tell me that I deserved it, like that guy did. That's why I left him." He un crosses his arms and un clenches his jaw but seems unconvinced.

"All right.. Annabel, I have to ask you something." He asks, stepping right in front of me, giving me literally no space at all.

"Ok, but why are you that close?" I ask, my breath hitting his shirt.

"Because I don't want you bolting on me when I say this. I want you to move in with me." Wait, did he just ask me that?

"Wait what?" I ask him. He smiles slightly before he responds.

"Annabel Stevens, I want you to move in with me. I want to make sure that something like that never happens again." He steps away but not to much.

"I don't know what to say.."

"If you need to think about it, then go ahead."

"Well I will, but I need to get home. I have stuff that has to be done." He raises an eyebrow.

"Well that's ominous. I have to stay at work so I can't drive you home but let me get you a cab." He hails me a cab then opens the door for me.

"Just think about it, I love you whatever your decision is." He kisses my cheek before I get in. He closes the door behind me. I give the cab my address and as he drives away, I'm see Flack watching the cab drive off.

The cab drops me off at my place, and by the time I get upstairs, I'm slightly tired and I lay down on my couch. Soon enough, I find myself falling asleep.

I wake up to screaming. I shoot up and see that there's smoke in my place, so I start coughing. I hear another scream then banging on my door.

"Get out, there's a fire." They scream. Fire, shit. I launch up from the couch and run to my door, and open the door. It's crazy as many people are rushing down the hallway. I become among those people but I get down there quicker, since I live alone. On the way down though, I can feel the smoke making its way down my throat, so again I start coughing a lot. Just when I feel that I can't take it anymore, I get outside and the air hits my lungs. I begin to walk, when a paramedic comes over to me.

"Come over here." So I follow her as she leads me to an ambulance, where she instructs me to sit down and she puts an oxygen mask on me.

(Flack's POV)

I'm where the fire at Annabel's building happened. Hopefully she's there safe and sound. She said some stuff needed to be done so hopefully that means they needed to be done outside of the house.

When I get to where Hawkes and Stella are, they come to me.

"We haven't seen Annabel yet Don.." Hawkes tells me as panic starts to rise in me.

"That hopefully means she's not here." Stella assures me. My eyes are still looking at every possible place I can see.

"Don, she's going to be unharmed. I know her, if she's dating you she'll won't be giving up that easily." Then we hear a radio go off.

"Second floor of the building seems to be the most effected." Oh god... I start pacing when we hear another voice go over the radio.

"Everything seems to be, no ones has been hurt. One girl is being treated though, seemed to have breathed in a lot of smoke as well as being coated in soot. She should be ok." My heart beats really fast now. God, where the hell is Annabel, I can't lose her, not now not ever.

"I'll go check and see if that's Annabel." Hawkes gets out before he starts running the other direction. In the mean time, I continue pacing and I continuously run a hand through my hair. I stop when Stella's radio goes.

"The girl, it's Annabel. Third ambulance on the left." That's all I need as I take off down the street, looking for the third ambulance on the left.

(Annabel's POV)

I've sat with the oxygen mask on my face for about 5 minutes when Hawkes comes running up to the ambulance.

"Ohh thank god." He then makes the radio announcement that the girl is me and I'm in the third ambulance on the left before leaving. As I take the mask off, I hear running footsteps. Soon Enough I see Flack run up to the ambulance doors.

"Annabel, your ok." He starts to climb in but the medic stops him.

"Woah, what do you think you're doing?" The medic asks.

"I'm her boyfriend and..." he digs out his badge. "New York Detective." The medics eyes widen.

"Ok, then I'll leave you two alone." The medic climb out the back of the ambulance. The minute she gets out, Flack has taken her place beside me. I get up and try to talk.

"Your... here" I start coughing.

"There's no where I'd rather be." He brings me up against him as he kisses the top of my head.

"Your fine your going to be ok." He says like he's telling himself that. He then gets up and helps me up, then helps me get out of the ambulance. He radios Stella telling her 'he's got me and that he's got me from here.' He leads me towards his car as he's got me practically glued to my side.

"You know I can walk right?" I get out without coughing. Wow, it's my first sentence without having a coughing fit.

"I know." He again kisses the top of my head as we get to his car. He helps me into the car before he gets in himself. He wastes no time as he quickly drives to his place. When we get there, he helps me get upstairs and into his place.

"I'll try to clean..." I motion to my body. "As best as I can." I walk into the bathroom and close the door. I take of my shirt, which is covered in soot but luckily my white tang top underneath is good and so are my shorts I'm wearing. I then get to work cleaning the soot off my arms and face, which I manage to do. When i look up in the mirror, I still have slight soot in my hair and on my face but I'm pretty good. As I walk out of the bathroom, I hear crying. I walk towards the noise and it's coming from the guest room.

Laying down, with his head facing the wall is Flack crying wearing only a pair of sweat pants.

"Are you crying?" I ask him. He looks towards me as he finally notices I'm in the room.

"Yeah, I am." I walk over to the bed and he pulls me onto it, and he situates me so I'm laying down between his legs, and the back of my head is laying against his chest. His arms come to wrap around my waist.

"I think it's time I tell you a story."

Wonder what kind of story he's going to tell her? Something to look forward to :)


	16. Chapter 16

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

"It was about 2 years back when it all started. There was another Detective by the name of Jess Angel. She was around us more and more around the team, and we started hitting it off, soon enough I was going out with her. When I was with her, I felt different when I was with her, and to be honest I thought she was going to be the one. That all changed one day. We were getting ready to transport someone when we got ambushed. Things got ugly quickly, and before I knew it she got shot. I was standing above her when she's lying on the ground, blood practically pouring out of her. She got to the hospital, but she died on the table.." His grip tightens on me as He buries his face into my neck. I then feel his tears spill onto my neck. It takes a good minute before he takes his face out of my neck.

"I was different after she died, I felt alone like I didn't know where to go. A lot of time I was just getting drunk, trying to wash away any memories left of her. It took me awhile to get back to the way I was before she died, and a huge part of it is because of the team."

"When I arrived at the fire today, I was just lost. I had no idea where you were, or even if you were alive. Like I felt the way when she was shot, granite you weren't shot but still. I couldn't go through that again, I can't go through that again. When I heard that you were alive and well, I was ecstatic. I almost burst into tears but I couldn't do that just yet." He puts his chin on my shoulder so his lips are right next to my ear.

"Annabel, I can't lose you. I do not know what I would do without you. I told myself that I can't let myself fall for another girl after what happened to Jess, but you changed that. I've fallen in love with you Annabel, and I don't want you to leave me, ever." He then brings his face into my neck again where he continues to cry. After a minute or so again, he takes his face out of my neck.

"All I want you to tell me is that you feel the same way."

"I do." I respond my voice sounding like it's getting constricted. I don't know what I was thinking, but I move his arms from me and start getting up.

"Annabel? Everything ok?" He asks as I finally get up off the bed.

"Yeah, I'm good." I walk out of the bedroom and towards the kitchen. I stand there with my back to the sink and my head towards the ceiling. He knows the basics of the guy who spit in my face, but he doesn't know the entire thing. I think I should tell him because he was honest with me about Jess. There's no way I would be able to tell me that if I was him, I wouldn't be able to. He did though and I admire him for that.

I look towards the entry into the kitchen and Flack's standing there. He comes into the kitchen and stands in front of me.

"Annabel, you know you can tell me anything." I look up at him and take a deep breath.

"The thing about the guy..."

"Ok, first start from the beginning, and second.." He lifts me up slightly, placing me on the counter so I'm no eye level with him. "I want you to look at me."

"I have to sit on the counter to look at you?" I ask him.

"Just tell me what happened."

"Ok so when I first moved here, my uncle Joey was a cop here before he retired and moved to Florida. He introduced me to his partner Jack, which I started going out with him. It was good for about a month, then it sort of went down hill. He got this attitude of 'Since I'm a cop, I'm better than you.' When I wouldn't do something right, that's when he would spit in my face, and would tell me I deserved it. I left when he had one day after I wasn't home when I said I would be, back-handed me across the face. That's kind of why I was an ass when I met you because I developed the mind-set of 'if one new York cop is a jackass, then they all are.' " I finish as I look him in the eyes like the entire time I have spoken.

"Well now that you said that, it explains a lot. Why didn't you ever file a police report." He asks as he picks me up and sets me back down on the floor.

"Whenever I did try to, it would never go anywhere because since he's a cop they believed him when he played the 'I didn't do anything card'."

"I'm sorry nothing ever got done. It's not right that the city's protecting him because he's a cop." I open my mouth when my phone rings in my shirt pocket where I left in the bathroom.

"Hold that thought." I tell him then run to the bathroom and pick up my shirt and take my phone out of my pocket.

"Yeah?" I answer.

"Hey Annabel, it's Danny. I'm here to give you the good news that the fire did not touch your apartment, it's just everything smells like smoke."

"Oh my god, thank you soo much Danny. You're the best!" I comment as I walk back out of the bathroom and towards the living room.

"Wow, if I'm the best after I tell you your apartment didn't burn down, I'd hate to see what Flack would have to do." I laugh as Flack comes into the room.

"Let's just say It would take a lot."

"He's got his work cut out for him. I'll talk to you later Annabel." He hangs up, and I stick my phone in my back pocket.

"What was all that about?" Flack asks as he's putting on a shirt.

"Danny just called to let me know my place wasn't affected by the fire. It just apparently smells like smoke, why are you putting a shirt on now." I ask, getting distracted.

"Look, I know you get excited when the shirts off but I don't think the other detectives going to be as thrilled." I contemplate that before I finally get what he's saying, he's leaving me to go to work, again.

I turn around to pick up my shirt in the bathroom. "Ohh so you have to go back to work?" I ask as I get into the bathroom.

"Yeah, I've got loose ends to tie up back at the department." I hear him say as I put my soot covered shirt back on and walk into the living room.

"I see. I have to get back to my place and work on a couple of things." I put on my shoes and see Flack has also changed into a pair of jeans.

"I'll drive you there." I turn around to look at him and he just kisses my cheek. "Don't thank me." He opens the door and I walk out, with him following me.

The ride to my place is silent for some reason. When he does pull up in front of my building.

"Want me to come in there with you?" He asks looking at me.

"No, it's ok."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes I'm sure." I laugh slightly.

"All right, I'll come by after work." He leans out of his seat slightly to kiss me. He pulls away with a twinkle in his eyes.

"I love you soo much Annabel." I get out of the car and look at him.

"I love you too." I close the car door, and watch as he pulls away. I waste no time as I rush into the building and onto my floor which is still slightly covered in ash. I unlock my door and sure enough nothing was damaged, but Danny was right it smells like smoke. When I close the door and look at the kitchen counter, there's a picture frame where there wasn't one. I look at it and it's a picture of Mac, Stella, Danny, Flack, Hawkes, an older man in scrubs and a younger man. The note on the frame reads.

_It's a 'your place didn't burn down' gift. Picture of the team including Sid (in the scrubs) and Adam (younger man beside Danny)_

_Stella and Danny_

Awww that was nice of them. Setting the frame back down in its place, I walk into my bedroom where I change into a fresh pair of jeans and a t-shirt. I then go to the kitchen to make myself something to eat when there's a knock on the door. I walk over to the door and open it to find Stella standing there.

"Stella what are you doing? Shouldn't you be at work?" I ask her as my I lean against the door.

"Yeah I should, but Mac gave Me, Danny, and Hawkes the night off since we don't have anything major coming into the lab and that fire here was caused by a stove being left on. Hawkes, Danny, and I wanted to know if you wanted to get some drinks with us. We asked Flack if he wanted to come and he said he'd meet us there in about 45 minutes, so do you want to come?" She asks.

"Yeah sure, just let me grab a jacket." I tell her as I step inside and grab my jacket, then step out and close the door behind me.

"Hawkes is waiting in the car outside." Stella tells me as we step outside. I see a black ford truck parked outside.

"That's us." We both walk up to the truck. I open the door behind the passenger side door and get in, closing the door behind me. When Stella and I get buckled in, Hawkes goes to start the car, before he can turn the ignition he scrunches up his nose.

"Annabel, you smell like smoke." He comments as he finally starts the car.

"Ohh it's my new perfume called Smoky Sensation."

"And now I know never to get it for my girlfriend.." He adds as he starts driving down the road.

"Yeah sorry, my apartment still smells like smoke."

"Don't worry about it, I've smelled worst when I've done autopsies." I shiver at the thought.

"Annabel, don't let Hawkes give you nightmares with the stories of what he's found in a dead body. Let him do that once, I will never be the same." Stella speaks as the car makes a left.

"The stories aren't that bad.."

"Hawkes... you gave Sid the creeps and that's saying something."

"Ok, point taken." He responds.

"Annabel, how's everything going with Flack?" She asks.

"He asked me to move in with me."

"That's great! What did you say?"

"I said I don't know, I didn't know what to say and I still don't."

"Just give it time." Hawkes pulls into the parking lot of a bar.

"Danny's here." Stella points to a black Harley Davidson sitting in one of the parking spaces. We hurry to get into the bar and join Danny at one of the tables off to the left. "Hey guys. Stevens, you came." We all sit down at the table and there's already a drink in front of us.

"Where else would I be?"

"You could be trying to get the smell of smoke out of everything you own. I see you brought that lovely smell with you..." He scrunches his nose just like Hawkes did.

"At least it somewhat suits her." Stella adds as she takes a sip of her drink.

"Ok so Danny I have to ask... are Hawkes autopsy stories disturbing?" I ask Danny as we all look at him.

"No comment.." Danny responds as he drinks.

"Wow, thanks Danny." Stella opens her mouth when there's a shadow standing over me suddenly. I turn around and I see it's a complete strange with a comb over.

"Sorry to interrupt but This girl right here kept getting my attention and I thought I would come over and introduce myself." The man says while licking his lips.

"You know what, that's my sister man so back off." Danny says as he looks up at the man.

"Oh this is your sister?" The man asks.

"Yeah she is, so I would suggest you take your ass back to wherever you came from and stay away." Danny stands up from the table.

"Anybody else want to make this girl's decisions for her?" The man asks as he points at me.

"Yeah, I think her boyfriend would like make some decisions." Flack's voice comes out of nowhere. The one time he's early.

I look at the man out of the corner of my eye and see that he's just standing there.

"I think this is the part where you walk away." Flack says to the man, and he finally gets the hint and walks away.

"Your early." Hawkes takes us away from what just happened.

"I got one of the other detectives to finish what needed to be done." He takes a seat next to me as he lightly kisses my cheek.

"Story time." Stella randomly announces.

"About what?"

"Annabel, would you like to know about the story where a suspect had Flack rolling through ketchup, mustard, and just plain filth?" She asks. Hawkes and Danny smile as I look over at Flack.

"Oh not this story, I don't think she wants to listen to this story." Flack comments.

"Ohh I think she does." I answer back to Stella.

"You are going to laugh." Danny adds.

"Ok, so me and Flack went to check out this guys food cart to see if he transported a dead body that he killed in it. The area where all the food carts were was just disgusting, there were rats there ok? Turns out he did and when we turned around to handcuff him, the guy ran. Of course Flack started chasing after the guy, the suspect had knocked over a bakery rack, making it fall over. He easily jumped over the rack, but had slipped on his landing, and rolled through god knows how many diseases were on that floor. We did ended up catching the guy when he started climbing a ladder and Flack grabbed the guys leg, tossing him over the side of the ladder and landing on a pile of wooden crates." When Stella finishes, I have a huge smile on my face. I'm trying so hard to not laugh.

"Are you laughing at that?" Flack asks me as he looks over at me.

"I'm not now but if you want me to I can."

"Wow, supportive much?"

"Come on, that was hilarious." He looks at me out of the corner of his eye.

"So Annabel.." Danny starts speaking "Why did you ever start dating this guy? I mean, I'm the guys best friend and I can barely stand him." I open my mouth but Flack speaks up.

"What? Jealous Messer?" Flack asks Danny in a joking matter, hopefully.

"Please Don, I've got a bike out there that's better than any woman." He motions outside.

"By the way Danny, that's an excellent bike. Mind if I take a look?" I ask him, hoping to get out of this conversation.

"Yeah sure, Hawkes why don't you come with us." He looks at us and nods his head. He get's up and follows us outside.

(Flack's POV)

I watch as Annabel, Danny, and Hawkes all go outside. My gaze is still at the door when Stella speaks up.

"Don, what the hell are you doing?" She asks bluntly. I turn around to look at her.

"Excuse me?"

"You went to work, after Annabel had escaped a fire in her building. Danny's been telling me you've left her to wake up alone in the morning without so much as a note. You left her in Oklahoma when she needed you, to get a lead on a case. What. The. Hell?" She asks me. I have done all those things, oh my god I must look a total ass.

"I don't Stella, I've felt like shit about all this."

"Well that's how you've made her feel." Stella adds as she takes a drink.

(Annabel's POV)

I'm standing outside with Danny. Hawkes would be here to but he said he had to leave. I'm standing next to Danny looking at the bike when he opens his mouth.

"He left ya again didn't he?" He asks. I turn my head to look at him.

"What?" I ask looking at him.

"He left you again, to go to work?" I turn away from him to look at the road.

"Yeah he did." I say, looking back at the building.

"He doesn't get what he's doing is wrong, you have to tell him that." I look back at Danny with a tear in my eye, knowing that telling him is going to be the hardest part.

"I know." I walk away from Danny and go back into the bar, and I see Stella and Flack sitting there, talking.

"I'm going to head on home. It's been a long day." Flack gets up from his seat and walks over to me.

"I'll take you home." He has his keys in his hand as he looks at me. He doesn't really give me a choice as he grabs my hand and starts pulling me towards the entrance. Once he get's outside he looks down at me.

"I figured that maybe I could spend the night at your place?" He looks down at me.

"Don't you have work in the morning?" I ask, knowing full well he probably does and will just end up leaving me alone in the morning.

"I don't work at all tomorrow, so I was wondering if you're not doing anything tomorrow, if you wanted to spend the day together." He asks as he raises his right hand to my face.

"I would like it." I find myself smiling at him.

"Good." He leans down and kisses me and for the first time in a while, it's not just quick and simple. He pulls away, eyes shinning.

"I'm going to drop you off at home, and then I have to go take care of a few things back at my place, then I promise I'll be right back." He leads me back to his car, and drives me to my place. He drops me off but as I walk into my building he follows me in.

"Thought you said you had to take care of a few things?" I ask him as I start walking up the flights of stairs with him following.

"I figured it could wait until tomorrow." We finally get up the two flights of stairs, and when I open my door he scrunches up his nose like the others did.

"Oh my god, the smell of smoke.." He walks in and closes the door behind him.

"Now you know why I smelled like smoke."

"What? You didn't smell like smoke at all..." All I do is look at him as I check my home phone for messages.

You have 1 message, left 25 minutes ago.

_"Mrs. Stevens this is Anthony Hodgins. I hate to inform you but I have decided to terminate your job here due to the fact that Don Flack had changed his recommendation by deciding to visit me and take swings at me. I wish you the best of luck though."_ What?! He got me fired?! That jackass.

I look to the left and see Flack walking towards me.

"Hey, what's going on?" He asks as he puts a hand on my lower back.

"I just got fired." I say through gritted teeth.

"What? Why would you get fired?"

"Why don't you listen for yourself." I mutter walking away towards the kitchen. Seconds later, you hear the message play over again. Right after the message ends, he starts coming over towards me.

"Now I know your mad.." he starts.

"Mad? No. Pissed, yes! You got me fired for punching my boss in the face!"

"I only clipped him! Besides you should be happy that you don't have to work for a guy that set you up in that house! He didn't even need the pictures, the house was being torn down."

"Yea sure that guy was a major ass hole, and for doing that I want to punch him in the face myself. That was the only job I had, that made it possible I could stay in New York. Now I have to most likely go back to Oklahoma." I look at him and his mouth is slightly open.

"Annabel, I forgot about that.. I'm so sorry." He comes forward, trying to bring me towards him, but I move away.

"You don't get it Flack do you? You basically just signed my ticket back to Oklahoma." I look over at him and regret is plastered on his face.

"Why don't you just go?" I ask him. His eyes widen.

"Wait, you can't be serious Annabel."

"At this point I am." I get up and walk over towards the door. I open the door and look at him. He sighs as he stands up from wear he was sitting and walks over towards me.

"Annabel, I..." He tries to speak but he shuts his mouth. He then walks out and looks back at me.

"I'm really sorry about this."

"I know you are Don, but sorry isn't going to cut it this time. Your going to need more." I then shut the door in his face, and it took all my power not to open the door again. I hear Flack dial a number and soon he goes "Hey, are you busy? I need to meet you. 30 minutes? Ok, I'll see you." He then hangs up and I hear him walk away from my door.

(Flack's POV)

I waiting where she told me to meet her, with is central park. I know meeting a girl sounds pretty shady, but I'm meeting my sister Sam here because I really need her help now.

So I am sitting on a bench in central park when my sister Sam starts walking up to me, with her long brown hair tied blows in her face. She comes up to me and sits on the bench next to me.

"So, what's so important you needed to meet me?" Typical Sam, gets right to the point.

"I need your help, with my girlfriend."

"Holy shit you need MY help, with a girl? How deep are you in?" She asks and I can't help but put a smile on my face.

"Very, to the point of where she's most likely on the verge of breaking up with me." When I look at her, she raises an eyebrow.

"Ok, she moved here from Oklahoma and was on the verge of having to move back when I found her a job so she could stay here. I got her fired from said jaw when I punched her boss in the face, twice. So now she's probably going to be moving back to Oklahoma."

"You weren't kidding when you said you were in deep. Tell me, why did you punch her boss in the face?" She asks me.

"Long story short, her boss was a total ass to her. She sees that, it's the fact that in her words 'signed her ticket back to Oklahoma.' I need your help because... I don't know what to do here, I'm lost." Sam chuckles to herself.

"Wouldn't be the first time you were lost." She mutters under her breath then continues. "Your best bet would be wherever she would happen to be, really show her how sorry you are and that you still care about her."

"Think it will work?" I ask my sister.

"It's the only option you have, unless you wanna just let her go this is your only chance. Knowing you though, you're not going to give up that easily."

"I just hope your right. I don't wanna lose her."

"Don, it's good to see you've finally moved from Jess, I know you'll always love her though." She puts her hand on my shoulder.

(Annabel's POV)

Once Flack left, I quickly left my place and headed to the bar that Flack took me to that's down the street from my place, which now I'm starting to think wasn't such a good idea because he sticks in my head and at the moment, I don't really want that, which explains the half empty glass of whiskey sitting in front of me. Might as enjoy however much longer I have here in New York.

I go to raise my glass up to my lips when I feel someone getting into the seat next to me. I look to the right and see a women with longer brown hair and blue eyes.

"He told me I might find you here." She comments as she orders a whiskey sour.

"And you are?" I ask, sitting up slightly.

"I'm Samantha, Don's sister." Ohh shit just my luck. I get up to walk away when she stops me.

"Can ya just listen?" I look at her and sit back down.

"I've experienced Don first hand; he's pushy, annoying, clueless sometimes, and most important caring. I mean I can't tell you how many times he's gotten me out of trouble." I look at her.

"That's a story for another time, the point is he's told me about you. Scratch that, he's gone on and on about you, and in a good way. He's told me what he did, and believe me it was an asinine move to make but what you don't see how sorry is. He called me today, and went on and on, and on some more on how sorry he was. He only clipped your boss because he cares about you."

"Not to call you a liar Sam, but it didn't seem like that." I say as I stare into my glass.

"Well maybe you should hear it from him." She gets up from her chair and starts to walk back towards the entrance when she turns back around. "When you talk to him next, ask him what he wants." Without another word, she walks out.

Ok first, what the hell was all that about? Shaking my head, I take money out to pay for my drink but there's already money set on the bar, belonging to an arm covered in a black leather jacket. My eyes travel up the arm to the face and I see Flack's face.

Ok, so that's the last cliff hanger! I promise! Anyways, I was kind of shaky on writing Sam so hopefully I did ok :)


	17. Chapter 17

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

I look at him and in my mind I'm thinking; why the hell do I seriously have the worst luck in the fucking planet. Can I get away from him?

"I don't need you to pay for my drink." I attempt to move his hand with the money off the counter but its glued there.

"Well to bad. My sisters right you know." He takes his hand off the counter, leaving the money there.

"Yeah she may be, but it's not fair of your sister to come here and do what you should be doing."

"I didn't ask her to come here, I didn't even though she was coming here until I heard her enter." He lifts up my glass and brings it up to his nose, smelling it slightly. He puts the glass back down.

"Whiskey, seriously? Why didn't you just come talk to me about it instead of drinking." He takes my hand and just holds on to it. I try to pull it out of his grasp but he gets the death grip on it.

"Because that was the exact opposite of what I wanted to think, was about you."

"Then why did you come here?" I shut my mouth and look down at the bar. "Exactly my point." He pulls me up from my seat and up in front of him.

"Look, I'm not asking for you to put everything behind us, because I know there's no way in hell I'd be able to do that so why should I expect you to? I also know I'm going to have a lot to make up for, I just want the chance to be able to do so. Besides I made a call, and got you another job." I laugh.

"What, you going to punch that boss in the face too?"

"I don't think it would be smart to punch a former Marine in the face." I look at him.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Mac, he's a former marine. He's been talking about needing a personal assistant for file delivery, coffee, other stuff when he doesn't have the time. I told him that you needed the job, and he said if you wanted, just be by this address..." He hands me a piece of paper "tomorrow morning at 9. I also figured it would be an opportunity to see the team more and from an inside source I know you hate having me leave in the morning or leaving you for work, and you'll see me during the day because I'm over there most of the time. Come on, you can't turn this offer down. You'll be getting two of the best things."

"Those would be?" I ask, finally pulling my hand out of his grasp.

"One, as I stated before you would get to see the team more, which we both know attached you are to them. Stella's practically your best friend, and the way you were talking to Danny and what he's said about you, your like his little sister. Then there's me.."

"I know I've been the worst person to you, I've stood you up and or left you, practically with no explanation what so ever, and I know I've acted like my job is more important than you, which it isn't. I've been pretty shitty towards you lately, which you have no idea how sorry I am about. I am actually surprised you've put up with me, then again that's just you being a nice person."

"Never thought you would say what you just did say." I respond as I look up at him.

"Neither did I.." He lifts his hand up to my cheek, his thumb going over my cheek.

"I am so sorry." He whispers then leans down to kiss me. He pulls away only to kiss my forehead. He then moves his hand from my face, down the side of my arm and rests at my elbow.

"There you go again with the charm."

"It is one of my better qualities. Come on, let me take you home." When I look at his eyes, they seem to have gotten incredibly clear, almost like a light blue.

"Ok." He then lightly grabs a hold of my arm and starts leading me towards his car. When we get in, I enjoy the 3 minutes it takes to get in front of my building.

"I guess I'll see you tomorrow morning?" Flack asks, a smile on his face. I lean out of seat slightly to kiss him, he grabs my arm, pressing me into him slightly. I pull away and he let's go of my arm.

"We'll see." I smile as I get out of the car and as I open the door to my building, he speaks up.

"I love you, why will always be a mystery."

"What's not to love?" I then turn around and walk into the building to where I head upstairs and instantly start to fall asleep when my head hits the pillow. As I almost fall asleep, there's a knock on the door. Groaning, I climb out of bed and stumble towards the door. When I unlock the door, Flack's standing on the other side of the door.

"What the hell are you doing?" I rub my eyes as I hold the door open slightly.

"I decided I'd rather spend the night, here with you. If that's ok if you."

"Just get in here." I walk away from the door and towards my bedroom. I walk back towards the bed and immediately get situated. I feel him walk into the room.

"Don't you dare turn the lights on." I mutter as I bury my face into the pillow.

"I wasn't going to touch them. Someone's touchy."

"Maybe I'll wake you up by knocking on your door at night. See how you feel."

"Fair enough." I feel him climb into bed next to me. He pulls me towards him and rests his hand against my stomach, his fingers barely under the edge of my shirt. The tips of his fingers are just skimming the skin of my stomach. I fall asleep with this happening, and thinking in my head he'll probably won't be there when I wake up.

My eyes open the next morning, and when I stretch upwards to read the clock, an arm is wrapped around my waist and it tightens its grip. I look over at my side to see Flack still sleeping. Holy shit he actually stayed until morning. I manage to read the clock and it says 7:45 am. Guess I should get ready for work.

I manage to remove his arm from waist and I get out of bed, then quickly grab something to wear. I then quietly walk in the bathroom and close the door behind me. I put on what I grabbed which was a white t-shirt, jeans, and gray blazer and brown heels. I then put my clothes in the hamper and I look over at him and he's still sleeping. I walk into the kitchen and prepare a pot of coffee when I get a phone call. I answer as I start the coffee.

"Hello?"

"Yes Annabel, it's Mac Taylor. Are you accepting the job?" He asks.

"Yes I am."

"Good, I can't be there though for your first day because I have to testify. When you get to the lab, Stella will be waiting downstairs for you. She will show you to my office and what I want you to do is there's going to be several large stacks of folders. What I need you to do is put them in alphabetical order, then the folders will either have a blue or green tab, organize them in alphabetical order within those groups. Got it?" He asks as I begin to pour the coffee into a cup.

"Got it."

"Good. Welcome to the team Annabel." He hangs up. I pick up my coffee and look at the clock on the stove and it reads 8:10. I have about 10 minutes. I finish my cup of coffee and I grab an apple from the fridge and when I look back up, Flack's walking out of the bedroom.

"What are you doing up at 8?" He asks, grabbing a cup and pouring his own cup.

"I'm taking the job." I look at him and he smiles as he puts down his cup.

"Honestly, I didn't think you would take it because when I gave you the offer you were still kind of mad..."

"Well, how could I turn the team? I'd miss Stella and the rest of them." I turn towards the coat rack and grab my coat off of it and put it on.

"Now that's just cold.." I turn around and walk up to him.

"You know I love you. I gotta get going, I'll see you later." I kiss his cheek and then walk towards the door.

"You can't bet on that last part." I look at him before I close the door behind me. I then rush outside and catch a cab. The cab drops me off in front of the address. It's a huge building, and Stella is waiting on the front steps for me.

"Annabel, glad to see you start working here." She gives me a hug then walks me into the building and leads me towards an elevator, when we both get in and she presses a button.

"So, How much trouble is Flack still in?" She asks.

"A lot."

"Good, gotta make him work for it."

"What is it?" I look at Stella as the elevator doors open to a floor where every room is surrounded with glass walls.

"Whatever you want 'it' to be." She begins to lead me down one of the halls and stops in front of the offices with countless pictures and plaques on the wall. In the middle of the room is a desk, and next to the desk is 5 piles of folders which either has blue or green tabs.

"There his office you know what to do." Stella gives my shoulder a pat before walking away. I head into Mac's office and put my jacket over the back of one of the chairs. I grab the folders and get to work.

I get so immersed into my work that I don't Flack walk into Mac's office until he speaks up.

"Having fun there?" He asks as he looks down at me. I look at him as I set a stack of files that have just been alphabetized. That finishes off any folders with a blue tab.

"Surprisingly yes, because it's somewhat calming." He laughs as he bends down and kisses the top of my head.

"Only you would find this calming. Anyways, did you eat lunch? It's... 11." Wow, one half took 2 hours. Great time sucker.

"No, I..." I speak too soon as he puts a sack down in front of me.

"What is it?"

"Stella asked me to bring it over, have no clue what's in it. Look, I love you but I have to go. I'll hopefully see you later."He kisses my cheek before walking towards the door. He opens the door, but looks back at me.

"Hey Annabel.."

"Yeah?" I look up at him.

"I know this may seem random but... you look amazing today." He then walks out the door and closes it behind him. Well that was.. unexpected. I smile as I turn back to the pile of folders with green tabs, which is much MUCH larger than the pile with blue folders. Guess I got my work cut out for me.

Three hours later, every single folder has been sorted and alphabetized and oh my god was it a pain in the ass. There was so many names in the same letter it was just agony. I stand up and walk out of the office looking for Stella, when I bump in to her.

"Annabel, I was just coming to see how the folders are going."

"Were going." I corrected her and she smiles.

"You finished? Nice work. I need you to Take these files down to Flack at the prescient. I would do it but I'm about to head out with Danny to check a lead." She hands me a stack of about 4 folders.

"Yeah sure."

"Thank you so much. When your done with that, you can come back and collect your stuff and your done for the day." I smile before walking off towards the elevator. I make note of what floor I'm on as I get in and begin my short ride to the prescient.

When I get in the prescient, the same old smell hits me and for some reason, it's gets worse every time. I walk up to Flack's desk, but he's not here so I just set them on top of his desk. I tell a nearby detective to let him know that I stopped by, then walked back out of the prescient.

As I hit the street, I try hailing a cab but have no such luck. Well maybe, if I walk a couple of blocks I will have better luck. I start walking to the left so I have better luck catching a cab. I get sidetracked as I get bumped into an Alley by some women walking down the street. I turn around and I sit a man in a black sweat shirt and he starts to come closer to me.

"You've got the wrong guy." He comes forward and pushes me against the wall, pinning me there. "That detective boyfriend you have though, Don Flack is his name? He's got two things going wrong." This guy knows Flack by his name, ok who the fuck is this guy?

"And those are." He takes his hands and somehow rips my shirt, tearing it down the middle so the shirt starts to show my bra and my breasts.

"As I said before he's got the wrong guy in custody. I'm the real guy who grabbed you, and second he's got you." He moves closer when headlights go off on the other end of the Alley, spooking the guy and sending him running the other way. Once the guy leaves I step away from the wall and look down at the front of my shirt and see it's cut to my bra line. Shit, shit. I ran down the alley, holding my shirt. I manage to catch a cab, the man gives me a look in the review mirror but I just give him the address for the lab.

When I get to the floor I was on just an hour ago, I look for Stella and find her in one of the offices towards the right. When I step in she widens her eyes and immediately comes towards me.

"Annabel, what the hell happened?" She asks, grabbing a jacket and covering my shirt with it.

"We have the wrong guy in custody."

"What? You ID'd the guy."

"I know I did, but this guy came up into the alley, telling me we had the wrong guy that attacked me, that he was the one who did what he did." I look up at the hall and see Danny walking down. He casually glances in and continues walking, but soon enough he back tracks to the door of Stella's office area and walks in.

"What the hell happened to Annabel?" He asks, stepping closer to me and her but careful not to get too close.

"Some guy stopped her in an alley, telling her that they had the wrong guy in custody, that he was the attacker. I'm going to guess he got her shirt."

"You wanna calm him or should I?" Danny says as he starts to pull out his phone.

"Why don't you, I have to process her shirt. Annabel, I know this is going to be embarrassing but you have to take of your shirt and give it to me, so I check it out. When your done, Danny will lead you to the locker rooms so you can have a little privacy time." I look at them, then take off the coat and take off my shirt. I hand it to Stella. I then but the coat back on.

"Thank you, I will get on this right away." She walks out the door. Danny helps me stand up as he shows me to the locker rooms. I go towards one of the benches and sit down.

"Annabel, if there's something else that happened you need to tell us."

"There was something else, I just don't feel comfortable talking about it." I mumble.

"Understandable." He responds. He takes out his phone, dials a number than hits the speaker. I recognize the voice instantly.

"Messer, what's going on?" Flack asks.

"Don, we got a bit of a situation with Annabel."

"Danny, what do you mean a situation? What the hell happened?" I can tell he's getting more and more anxious.

"That's the problem, we don't know. She came in, from what I heard with her shirt ripped and she said that we have the wrong guy in custody, how the guy that attacked her is the one that's still out. Stella's processing the shirt, now she's now in the locker room." I hear the sound of someone hanging up, and Danny shuts his phone.

"I take it he's coming." Sure enough, Danny was right because 10 minutes later or so later there's a knock on the locker room door. Danny walks over and opens it, I hear quiet talking and then I hear the door closing again. I look over and see Flack coming over and sitting next to me on the bench.

"You ok?" He asks as he lightly lays his hand on my knee which I flinch from slightly.

"As ok as I could be." I take the coat off because one I'm starting to get hot and two I trust him. As I feel the coat off, he widens his eyes slightly when he sees what I'm wearing.

"Why don't you tell me what happened?" He's takes his hand off my knee and puts it at his side.

"After I left the prescient to drop folders off, I tried to catch a cab out front with no such luck. So I started walking to the left when I got bumped into the alley. I turn around and I see a guy in a black sweatshirt. He pushed me against the wall telling me we have the wrong guy..." I take a deep breath as I wring my hands together.

"Take your time." He whispers as he lays his hand on my knee again.

"I asked what he meant, he just said that he was the guy that attacked me. He knew you Don, he knew that you were going out with me." I drop my head slightly as he moves his hand from my knee to the back of my head. His hand moves from my head, down the back of my neck and rests at my back.

"I'm sorry. Annabel, look at me." I look up at him.

"As long as I'm here, nothings going to happen to you ever again, we'll get the guy that did this" He leans forward, planting his lips right between my eyes, then pulls back.

"I'll be back, don't go anywhere." He grabs the jacket, and drapes it over my shoulders before kissing the top of my head. I bring the jacket closer towards me as I just sit there.

(Flack's POV)

I all but slam the door closed as I walk out of the locker room. I start walking down the hallway on a mission when Danny pops out of no where.

"Wanna go question a scum bag in jail with me?" I all but practically yell as I walk faster towards the elevator and Danny some how keeps up.

"You know I do, quick question how you doing with all this?" He asks as we hit the elevator.

"Why do you think I want to go talk to this guy?" I respond through gritted teeth as we step into the elevator.

"Flack, you grit your teeth any harder they're going to shatter. I know your beyond angry about this, as is every one else on this team..."

"Danny you don't get it.." I tell him as I change my stance. "I told her I would make sure this didn't happen again, yet I let it happen. Damn it, I was right down the street in interrogation with some punk kid when it happened. I've let her down, again. I can't keep doing this to her, she deserves better." The doors open and Danny puts his arm out from to stop me from walking any further.

"Listen man, she deserves you. You're the right guy for her, deep down I know you know that. Now get your head out of that mindset and let's go talk to the guy." Danny removes his arm and I start walking forward again to the department.

We are now in the interrogation room with the guy that 'supposedly' didn't attack her. I don't believe that shit that someone else attacked her for a minute. I'm standing on one side of the table with my arms crossed with Danny next to me and Kenny across the table.

"Ok, so my friend here is not in the best of moods right now. It would help if you just answered the questions we ask you." Danny starts off as he slowly paces the end of the table.

"What happened to your friend? Rangers didn't win?" Kenny puts a sinister grin on his face.

"More like his girlfriend was attacked in an alley. Now Kenny, we know your covering for someone, because the guy that attacked her ratted ya out, said you weren't the guy." Danny opens his mouth to continue when I do.

"Imagine our surprize when she ID'd you and your DNA was found on her, but yet he's says it's not you."

"Kenny, at this point we believe this guy more than you so just tell us, who are you covering for?" I ask, starting to circle the table.

"I don't know what you guys are talking about, I did what I did to her. Annabel was her name, right? Man was it nice watching her whimper in pain." That's when I lost it. I walk over to one of the table and got right in his face.

"Kenny, unless you want to be thrown in jail for the rest of your life with 2 assault charges and whatever the hell I can throw at you, I suggest you open that mouth of yours and tell us some USEFUL information." I raise my voice, and clearing showing how pissed I am, he gets scared.

"So what's it going to be? Life in jail or freedom?" Danny asks getting in his face as well.

"Ok! I didn't do it! My twin brother Luke, put me up to this, told me to cover for him." Danny get's out of his face, and regrettably I do too.

"Officer." I motion through a window for a detective to come through. He opens the door and looks at me.

"Take this man back to his cell, and call for a transfer." The other detective helps the guy out of his seat.

"Woah, you said I was going free if I came clean. What'd I do?" Kenny asks as he fights the detective slightly.

"It's called Obstruction of Justice, look it up while you're in jail." I glare at the guy as the detective takes him out and shuts the door behind him. Danny turns towards me.

"Explains why she ID'd the guy, there probably Identical twins. DNA would be the same too, but here's the thing, how is the real guy not in the system?" He asks as he leans up against the wall.

"I have no clue.." I mutter as I run a hand through my hair.

"Don, what's going on? Is this what we talked about earlier?"

"Yeah it is. Danny i can't shake the feeling that I somehow caused all this to happen to her, I mean look what's happened to he since she started going out with me. She got attacked twice! I can't keep putting her in danger like this." I let out a breath as I leave the interrogation room with Danny behind me.

"Woah Flack, are you seriously saying that right now? Did you get thrown around at work today, what the hell ya thinking?" He takes his hand and hits me upside the head.

"What do you think you're doing Messer?" I ask him slightly agitated.

"Trying to knock some sense into you." I laugh as I start walking back to my car, and to the lab.

(Annabel's POV)

I finally get the courage to walk back out, after Stella gave me an extra shirt she had in her locker to wear, which I put on almost immediately after she gave it to me. I walk out of the locker room, straightening the shirt and I have a bit of confidence in my walk because I decided that, I'm not going to let this guy get to me, I'm not letting him change who I am because he attacked me.

As I walk out of the locker room with Her coat drapped over my arm, I bump into Flack coming towards the direction I was coming from.

"Hey there, what's with the bounce in your step there? He asks as I continue walking the other direction. He of course changes his course and starts following me.

"Figured, why let this guy get to me? He's the one that's going to be in jail." He grabs my arm to stop and he turns me around to look at him.

"That's great that your letting this get to you. I told you, you are a strong person." His hand stays at my elbow but he pulls me towards him and he kisses me slowly, and softly. I hate to make this sound cliché but when he kissed me it was like sparks flew. He pulls away, but keeps his hand on my elbow.

"Listen, I'm working tonight so I can get the guy that did this to you. I wanted to let you know so you didn't wait up for me like you did last time." He gives me a look of amusement before he continues. "I'll have somebody drive you home because after today I don't want you in a cab or any public transportation unless I'm with you." I give him a look as I try to pull my elbow out of his grasp.

"Don't you give me that look, I don't want you getting hurt. Just be careful ok?" He asks, letting go of my elbow.

"I'll be careful."

"Good, I gotta go. I'll see you in the morning." He kisses my forehead real quickly. "I love you Annabel." He looks back at me before walking the other direction. Guess I get ready to go home then, huh?

Ok, so I have some news; good and bad. Bad news, there's only going to be a few chapters more of The New York Detective That Complicated My Life :'( Good news, I have decided to write a sequel, don't know what I'm going to call it, but there's a sequel :) yay for you guys!

Other news, I'm going to have two more major events happen before this ends and hopefully you'll enjoy them. Last news, PRE SPOILER THE LAST CHAPTER OF THIS FANFIC WILL BE A CLIFFHANGER, LEADING OFF INTO THE BEGINNING OF THE SEQUEL! :) hope you guys are excited as I am :D


	18. Chapter 18

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

After Flack walked away, I started walking back to Mac's office to grab my coat. When I get there, my phone is going off in my coat pocket. I rush over to my jacket and answer the phone.

"Hello?"

"Annabel, its Mac. Stella told me what happened, you ok?" He asks as I put my coat on.

"I am fine, thank you for asking."

"She also told me that Danny and Flack had gotten the name of the guy that had attacked you from the guy that's presently in jail." I close the office door and sit down on one of the chairs.

"Yes they did."

"I need you to do one more thing for me. In the top drawer on the left is a black folder." I walk over to the desk, and open the top drawer on the left and sure enough, there's a black folder sitting there among other things. I grab it then close the desk drawer.

"Got it."

"Ok, what I tell you now you can not repeat to anyone. There's a picture on the far wall of my office, it's the largest one. Lift the picture frame off the wall." Ok, this is sounding really creepy. I find the far wall with my eyes, then I see the largest picture of the wall. Carefully, I walk over and lift it off the wall. When I set the picture down on the floor, I look up at where the picture was and I see a small safe.

"Ok, I'm looking at it."

"Good, their's a keypad on the safe to open the door. Enter the combination 632904 on the keypad." I enter the numbers on the keypad, and I hear a click. I open the door to the safe and it's empty. Putting the folder in there, I close the door.

"The folders in there."

"Hit 632904 again on the pad to lock it." I enter the code again and I hear a click again. I make sure it's locked, then I put the picture back over the safe, and close the drawer on the desk.

"Everything's back in order. What was in that folder that needed to be locked in a safe?" I ask as I sit back down. I hear him sigh before he speaks.

"In that folder, was evidence that incriminated Luke as your attacker. I don't want the folder with other cases because this case because of where you stand with us is personal. Look I'm on my way back to the lab, so I have to go. I appreciate you doing that just now." He hangs up, and I stick my phone in my pocket. I then walk out another door to Mac's office that puts me in view of the glass window to outside.

I start walking to the right when I see a security guard coming up to me.

"Maim, I'm going to have to ask you to evacuate the building, everyone else has already left the building. There is a toxic gas leak and everyone has to get out." I let my eyes skillfully land on his security badge and it has a different picture of the ID card then the face that's carrying it.

The guy catches me looking at his badge and his face so he takes his gun out of his holster.

"Maim, get moving." He growls at me. Ohh shit...

"Ok, I'm going." I stick my hands up in defense and start walking down the hall. When I look behind me to make sure the guy has his back turned to me and he does, I run into a nearby room where some of the lab equipment is kept. I crouch down against one of the counters so if they were to walk by, they couldn't see me.

Oh god, things are not looking good. Shit, what the hell do I do? I take out my phone and re dial the number that Mac had called me on.

"Detective Taylor." He answers.

"Mac, there's something going on at the lab." I rush out as quietly as I can so they can't hear me.

"Slow down Annabel, what's going on?"

"I was about to leave the building when a security guard who had a different ID card then his face came up to me telling that there was a gas leak. When I looked at his face then badge, he took his gun out and asked me again. That's when I came in here." I hear Mac swear under his breath.

"Someone infiltrated the lab to get something or someone. Annabel, stay in the building but do not get seen by ANYONE or let them catch you. They're probably after what's in the safe and you know the combination. If they get ahold of you, they'll probably try to get the combination out of you. Whatever happens or whatever they try to do to you, do not and I repeat do not give up that combination."

"Got it." After when he said that, he's got me scared shitless.

"Annabel you'll be fine, I will the police set up outside and we will treat this like a hostage situation. We'll be outside shortly in the mean time, just try to stay calm and quiet. Also try to stay where you're at. Keep this phone on at all times and on you." Mac hangs up and I put the phone in my pocket. I crouch further behind the counter as I hear two male voices.

"Boss, I found this jacket." One man says to the other, and I assume it's my jacket.

"Son of a bitch..." He mutters. "Someone's still in this building. Rookie, I don't want you coming back to me unless this person is dead, got it?" The other man yells at the first one.

"Got it sir." I then hear the footsteps of the man walking away. Shit, they know I'm here. I carefully look over the counter and see one of the men walking away, he has short brown hair and is wearing some sort of workers uniform. The other man I can't tell what he's wearing or what he looks like. I sink back down to the ground, with my eyes and ears on high alert.

(Flack's POV)

I'm across the street of the lab in a vest along with Mac, Stella and Danny with dozens of cops surrounding us. I was on the search for Annabel's attacker when I got the call from Mac that some guys were in the lab that aren't suppose to be there, and there's a girl in there

"Ok, so do we know who is in there?" I ask as I turn towards the rest of them.

"I don't. Do you Danny?" Stella responds as she looks at Danny.

"No, you Mac?" We then turn towards Mac and he just looks at us.

"Mac, come on. Who's the girl in there?" I ask, stepping closer to him. He sighs before speaking.

"Annabel's in there." He looks me in the eye. WHAT! She's in the fucking lab, with maniacs who most likely have guns.

"What? Why the hell is she still in there?" I ask Mac, the anger boiling now.

"I asked her to do something in my office, and she knew something was suspicious so she hid and called me. Don, she'll be ok, she'll make it out just fine." Mac tries to calm me down but it doesn't work.

"How the hell do we know that?"

"Because we have direct contact with her." He holds up his cellphone. "Stella, you still have the extra glock in your desk?" Mac asks her.

"Yeah, why?"

"Because your walking her through it." Mac hands the phone to Stella.

"There's no way in hell Annabel is..."

"Flack, do you want her out of this alive?"

"Yeah but.."

"Then, Stella's going to lead her through this."

(Annabel's POV)

I'm still sitting with my back against the counter in the lab when the phone goes off. I quickly answer it before any of the men notice it.

"Hello?" I ask, my voice wavering because I'm scared out of my mind.

"Annabel, it's Stella. How you holding up?" She asks softly.

"I'm doing surprisingly well, given that I'm trapped on a floor with pyschos."

"You'll be good. Listen, I'm going to give you instructions. You have to follow these exactly ok? While also making sure no one see's you."

"Ok, lay it on me." I respond, getting on my knees.

"First, you need to find your way to my office." She tells me. I get up off the ground and peak out the doorway. I recognize the hallway and her office is to the right of the hallway. I make sure no one is in the hall or sounding rooms and I make a break for Stella's office area. When I get there, I crouch behind the desk I've seen her sitting at.

"Ok, Stella I'm here." I say, slightly panting.

"Wow, you got there quickly. Ok, there's the bottom drawer on the right, in there should be a Gun." I do what she says and sure enough, there's a gun.

"You know what to do with the gun? You being from Oklahoma and all?" She asks, a hint of laughter in her voice.

"If we weren't in this situation, I'd say you were profiling me. Yes, I know what to do with a gun." I put the safety on the lock and tuck the gun into my waistband.

"Good, well there's someone who wants to talk to you." I hear her pass the phone off to someone and some rustling, then footsteps walking away from the rest of them.

"Hey there Killer." Flack's voice comes through the phone.

"Hey." I ask, sighing as I rest my head against the desk.

"How you holding up in there?" He asks.

"Don, I'm scared out of my mind here. How the hell am I going to make it out of this, alive?"

"Easy, you'll make it out because of how strong of a person you are. Annabel, I know you can do this, you're going to make it out of this. Besides, there's something I have to tell you when you get out of there, so you can't die on me ok?" I can tell the slight desperation in his voice.

"Why would I die on the one man I love?" I ask, tears coming to my eyes slightly.

"I love you too Annabel Stevens. Listen, I have to go. You hang in there ok?" He asks.

"Definitely."

"Good, see you later." I hear him hang up, so I stick the phone back in my pocket. It wasn't long before I heard a phone ringing, that wasn't mine. I hear one of the men answer it.

"We're kind of busy right now." The man barks out. Somehow, the phone gets put on speaker.

"This is Detective Mac Taylor. We have police officers and multiple detectives surrounding the building."

"And that matters because?"

"One of the detectives out here happens to have a personal connection with the girl that's in there. What is it that you exactly want?" Mac's voice rings out.

"All the more reason to find her. Besides, all I want is the code to the safe my men found in an office." I take this as my opportunity to sneak my way out of Stella's office and creep my way down the hall.

"Then again the girl probably knows the... hey!" He sees me making my way behind a column. I peak around the column and he's taking out his gun. I get behind the column fully just as he fires his gun, shattering nearby glass. When I hear footsteps, I make a bolt across the broken glass and start running. Without stopping, I make a run down the hall and hide in a near by room which looks like some sort if conference room. I hide my body in a corner so they can't see me. My phone goes off and instead of it being Mac's phone calling, it's Flack's. Ohh shit, I think he heard the gunshots.

I answer the phone, and grimace as I can already hear his voice.

"ANNABEL WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!" He screams through the phone. And that's how you break an ear drum.

"Hello to you to. That was a gunshot and before you ask, I'm fine. The shot hit some near by glass and shattered it. I've got a couple of nicks on my ankle from running through glass but other than that I'm fine." I hear him verbally go 'thank you god'.

"Why were you even shot at in the first place? You know what, that's not the point. Danny's heading in there to get you, I'd go in there but I can't. I'll see you when you get out?"

"Nope, because as soon as I get out of this building, I'm leaving you to live with 7 cats." There's silence on the other end.

"I'm kidding." He lets out a breath.

"And that's why I'm happy I'm allergic to cats."

"I love you." I say, then hang up and situate myself further into the corner. For the first time, I take my gun out of my waistband and take it out. I tuck it in my hand, and keep it pointed at the door. My hand starts falling asleep with I see Danny slowly make his way into the room.

"Woah, there Stevens. Didn't know you were packing heat." He raises his hands up as he tucks his gun in his holster.

"Did you see them?"

"No I didn't see any of them, heard them. Then again I think the state of New Jersey could hear them. You ok?" He asks as I get up off the ground and come towards him.

"I know one way to get out, there's an old trash shute on this floor, that if you go down drops you off in a trash bin they keep in the garage. And before you speak, yes they still keep trash in the bin." I shake my head before I speak.

"Ok."

"All right, follow me. Stay behind and be ready." He re draws his gun as do I. Soon we're both walking out of the room with our guns drawn, and prepared for anything. As I follow him, we so far run into no one.

We turn left down a hallway, the man who I did spot sees us. Before he can utter a word, Danny fires his gun and a shot rings out. I look at the man and he goes down, with a bullet in his leg. Danny reaches for the radio on his vest.

"One suspect down with a gunshot wound to the leg, he should be fine. We're on our way down." He puts the radio down as Mac's voice responds 'Good work.' Danny continues to lead me through the halls, and eventually we land in front of a trash shoot. We both look at each other.

"Ladies first." He comments as he holds the trash shute open.

"Let's skip that rule today shall we?" I respond. Danny just shakes his head as he prepares to get into the shute.

"Hold on Detective, let's talk here." A man's voice comes through. We both snap towards him, Danny pointing the gun at him. I look at him, and it's the guy that had told me we had the wrong guy.

"We don't talk to ass hole criminals that try to kill the people we love." Danny keeps his voice calm as The guy pulls a gun and points it at us.

"I think we should have a discussion though, talk about you two are going to be dead in a few minutes here."

"Luke, it's over. Put the gun down and you can get out of this alive." He raises his voice at Luke.

"Ohh you guys are going down with me." Then Luke fires, Danny firing almost simultaneously. Luke goes down, with a bullet in the heart. Luke's shot hits the wall behind us.

"Let's get out of here before we get killed." Danny speaks up as he sticks his gun in his holster. I put the safety on my gun and stick it in my waistband. Danny holds the shute opens, and raises himself in then jumps. Soon after he jumps, you can hear him going through the vent. Hoping that he's far enough down, I then get myself in the shoot, and jump. As I go through the shute, the metal walls are slowly feeling like their closing in on me. Good thing I don't have claustrophobia.

After a minute or so, I see the light and I get out if the trash shute. Landing in a huge pile trash, luckily cushioning my fall. I stand up from the pile of trash I landed in, and see Danny doing the same.

"Oh my god, the smell." I comment as I stand up and get out of the trash bin as Danny follows me afterwards.

"Were out aren't we? There's something in your hair." He comes forward, and picks some sort of meat out of my hair.

"Ohh god." I shutter as he shows me the meat before tossing it aside. "How the hell am I going to get the smell out of my skin?"

"Guess the water company's going to get a lot of use from us. Let's get back towards the others." We start walking out one entrance of the garage. Within a few minutes we are across the street and down a block from the rest of them. We cross the street and I'm still getting trash out of my hair. As we start walking down the road, Stella sees us, but doesn't say anything.

When we reach them, Mac and Stella come towards us.

"How did you guys get out of there?" Mac asks, giving us the once over.

"Two words; trash shute." Stella comes forward to give me a hug but I step away.

"I wouldn't do that Stella, I smell like a fucking garbage disposal."

"Well if you haven't noticed brainiac, you went down a trash shute." I hear Flack comment as Stella hugs me anyways. Stella let's go shortly after hugging me.

"You weren't kidding about the smell, my god." She steps away and I walk over to Flack. He looks down at me as he picks some more of the 'meat' out of my hair.

"How's it feel, surviving all that. The adrenaline wear off yet?" He asks, pulling me against his chest.

"He's dead, Luke's dead." I mumbled as I buried my face into his bullet proof vest as much as I could. He leads me away from the rest of the group.

"He's dead, how?" Flack asks as he looks down at me.

"Danny shot him. He shot at us, so in return he fired."

"He's gone now, he can't hurt you any more." Flack pulls me away from him to take off his vest, then pulls me back towards him again. He rest his hand against my right shoulder but pulls it away.

"Let me take you home, so you try to get this smell out of your skin. Cause to be honest, I think I like the smell of smoke on you better." I punch his arm as we start walking towards the others.

"Hey Annabel, in about 2 hours or so. The rest of us are going out to celebrate you making out, you have no choice your coming." Stella speaks as the rest of them take their vests off.

"But what if I have.."

"Those plans are going to be cancelled. No exceptions." Mac says in a firm tone, yet he has a smile on his. I just shake my head as Flack puts his hand on my lower back and starts leading me to his car. When we get to his car, we both waste no time stepping inside the car and he drives to my place.

When we get outside my building, I get out of the car as does he.

"You know you don't have to come in with me right?" I ask, digging for my keys in my pocket.

"I know." He responds as he comes up from behind me. I'm still digging for my keys when he rests his hands on my hips. He takes my hands and puts them down at my sides. With his fingers on his left hand splayed over my upper thigh, he takes his other hand and reaches into my pocket. The entire time he's doing this, his breath is on my neck, warming it slightly.

It takes him a few seconds before he gets the keys out of my pocket and hands them to me before he takes his hands off my hips.

"Thank you." I get out as I enter my building and climb the two flights of stairs to get to my place. When I unlock my place, I start walking towards the bathroom.

"Make yourself at home, I'll be getting this smell out of my skin." I walk off towards the bathroom but Flack comes up behind me once again. He turns me towards him. He starts to lean in when I put my hands on his shoulders.

"I don't think you want to do that, with the smell."

"I could care less about the smell." He replies as he very quickly leans down and kisses me. I try to pull back, but he pulls me back in. I eventually put my hands on his chest and push him slightly.

"I'll be right back." I smile at him before walking off towards the bathroom.

So, I hate to say this but the next chapter, is the last chapter of The New York Detective That Complicated My Life but there's the sequel to look forward too :)


	19. Chapter 19

The New York Detective That Complicated My Life

I stand in the shower for easily 30 minutes, just trying to get the smell of Garbage out of my skin. When I get out of the shower, I realize I forgot to bring clothes with me into the bathroom.

Muttering under my breath, I grab a towel and wrap it around my body. I open the bathroom door and walk out. As I finish tucking the towel in, I hear Flack's voice.

"I like what I'm seeing Annabel." He whistles slightly.

"It's a towel, it can't be that appealing." I roll my eyes slightly as I walk into my bedroom.

"You know damn well I'm not talking about the towel." He responds as he follows me into the bedroom.

"Don, what are you doing in here?" I ask, turning around to face him which was a mistake because he grabs the edge of my towel and pulls me towards him.

"We have some time to spare before we have to meet the rest of them." He pulls on the edge of my towel slightly.

"Yeah... no. Sorry to disappoint." I grab his hand and take it off my towel.

"Your no fun." He kisses me before walking out of the room and shutting the door behind him.

Once the door is shut, I walk over to the door and lock it just for good measure. I then take off my towel and walk over to My closet and take out a pair of Jeans, a dark green tang top shirt and brown high-heeled sandals with dark green accents. After I finish getting dressed, I walk over to the door and unlock it. I then walk out and of course I have Flack rounding the corner.

He scans me head to toe with his eyes before speaking up.

"I gotta say, I think I like you in a towel better."

"I think most men would agree with you on that."

"If their agreeing with me on that, there's something wrong. You still though look amazingly beautiful." He leans forward slightly. "Offer still stands."

"Offer is still being declined... For now. Shouldn't we head out soon?" I ask him, looking over his shoulder.

"I was told not to leave until Stella calls. Off subject here but you never answered me." I look up at him and raise my eyebrow.

"About?"

"Whether you would move in with me or not." ohh yeah, that little chestnut. Well, I have been thinking and I realized, If I love him and I know he feels the same, then I should move in because it wouldn't make sense not to. So, let's mess with him a bit shall we?

"Really? Cause I could have sworn that I said yes, then again I'm probably mistaken." He looks at me for a moment, and then get's what I'm saying. He pulls me up against him.

"Do you have to yank my chain?" He asks as he kisses the top of my still wet head.

"What can I say, I live for it."

"Should I be concerned that you live to do this to me?"

"I don't know, you're the detective. Figure it out." I pull away from to grab a bottle of water from the fridge.

"Wow, that's cold." I take a drink from the bottle, then set it down. I open my mouth, but his phone rings. He actually has to walk to the counter across the room to answer it.

"I'm surprised your phone isn't surgically attached to your belt this time."

"Someones vicious today." He picks up his phone and answers it.

"Flack." He answers. "Hey Stella, yeah we're leaving right now. See you shortly." He hangs up then sticks the phone in my pocket.

"We've been summoned." He walks over to my door and opens it, motioning for me to walk through.

"You know I can open doors right?" I ask as I walk out the door. He just shakes his head as he shuts and locks the door with my keys.

We take the silent walk down to his car, and the silent to the bar they ordered me to go to in a way. When we both get out of the car, Stella's out front. She walks up to us and pulls me into a hug.

"Didn't trust us that we would make it on our own?" I ask as she pulls away.

"Couldn't take any chances now could we? Come on the rest of them is inside." She starts walking towards the entrance.

Flack curls an arm around the back of my waist and tucks me closer to him. We then follow her towards the entrance. When we get in, Stella leads us towards the back of the place and to a table where Mac, Hawkes, Danny, are all sitting. Danny stands up from the table and walks over to me. At this point, Flack reluctantly let's go.

"There you are." He leans forwards and gives me a slight hug. "Still smell like whatever the hell was in that trash bin. Don't worry I've got the same smell."

"I think the smells going to permeate from my skin for a while." I respond as Danny walks over to Flack and gives him a half man hug thing before we all sit down.

"So.." Mac starts out. "Interesting first day huh?" I laugh slightly.

"More like freaking hectic but interesting's good too."

"How do you guys handle all that? The rush of it all? I almost had a heart attack."

"That's just our jobs."

"Wait, Annabel I have a question. When are you taking Flack to meet your parents?" Danny asks, causing everyone to look at me.

"Not any time soon."

"Why? You embarrassed by them?" Danny responds with a twinkle in eyes.

"Yep." Everyone chuckles slightly.

"Least she's honest." Hawkes adds.

"Let's get off that subject. Don, earlier you told Annabel you said you needed to tell her something, what was it?" Mac asks Flack. He gives him a look of 'really?' before looking at me.

"You know I'm stubborn, a pain the ass, and half of the time, I don't see what's going on. You see past that, and I can't help but love you for that."

"When I'm with you, I feel like I can be myself. Not the hard ass cop everyone thinks I am." He sends a look at Danny before continuing. "I know I've messed up pretty badly, yeah believe me when I say that now that I think about it, I probably shouldn't have punched your boss in the face. I would be willing to do that again, before that was for you. Anything stupid I have done, I would do it all again for you."

"Guess I probably should get to the point. I was scared today when you were stuck in that building. Wait, no scared doesn't even begin to describe what I was feeling, terrified out of my mind works better. I just know, I don't want to feel that way again, ever. Whether it's you're in danger, or your gone. So..." He gets up out of his chair, and turns my chair slightly so I'm facing him. Flack then get's down on one knee and pulls a ring out of his pocket. Holy shit, holy fucking shit. He is fucking proposing.

"Annabel Stevens, will you marry me?"

I know I left it at the worst possible ever but I promise the first chapter of the sequel will be out very soon! Anyways thanks to anyone to read, reviewed, followed, and favorited this and I hope you are excited for the sequel :)


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